Alone in the Wild
by raydoesminecraft
Summary: After a devastation in the Sky Army, CaptainSparklez (Jordan) decides to leave his friends to start a new life for himself. What will he find?
1. Chapter 1

**Listen to this while you're reading. It sets the mood, especially for the letter.**

** watch?v=yvm-yYbEn-Y**

**This is my first series for this account! Hope you enjoy it!**

You're in the Nether. Hundreds of zombie pig men try to smack you with their gold swords. Red, hot, fiery lava surrounds your feet. Herobrine, the godly man of fire, smirks from his nether brick castle as you start to burn. In a rage of hope you leap from the lava and sprint to a portal. Before you go through, however, more zombie pig men attack you from all directions. One happens to finally get his arm on yours. The other pig men drag you to Herobrine and force you on your knees. One moment and your life is gone.

Well… when I'm referring to you, I actually mean me. I suppose we start from the beginning though:

I'm Jordan, also referred to as CaptainSparklez. In the beginning I was acquaintances with Sky, leader of the Budder Army. I was a recruit for as long as I can remember. My other friends included Ty, Ryan, Jerome, Mitch, Quentin, Noah, and others whose names have slipped my thoughts. For years we battled the evil and fierce squids until a devastating attack destroyed many troops leaving only a few of us left. Sky was suddenly kidnapped by the squids and never seen again. I heard that Ty took his position as leader, but he never really got the trust of everyone else. I, on the other hand, could not stand my friends gone so I left, leaving only a note. From what I can decipher of my old handwriting, it reads:

"Dear Sky Army,

"There is freedom within, there is freedom without. Try to catch the deluge in a paper cup. There's a battle ahead, many battles are lost. But you'll never see the end of the road while you're traveling with me. Hey now, don't dream it's over. Hey now, when the world comes in, they come to build a wall between us. We know that they won't win." The battle has made us lose many innocent lives, including our beloved leader and friend. It is time, nevertheless, to part my separate way. All the stress and depression has really gotten the best of me. One thing: Ryan, you have honestly been the best partner a guy like me could find. And as for the rest of you, I wish you all luck in your future journeys but as for me, well, I must move on. I will miss all of you dearly.

Your fellow Sky Army recruit and friend,

Jordan"

Oh, I miss those old days. Hunting in the woods with friends. Sacrificing my life in battles that I knew we would win. From the day that I left the headquarters my whole world started to crumble around me. However I did not know of the adventures that would come of me being alone in the wild.

**Any suggestions for what he should find in his journeys?**

**OC's always welcome!**


	2. Chapter 2

**I won't bother posting the link so… sorry doods… you gotta find it for yourselves. The song for this chapter is: Clarity by Zedd. (If you can, find the Kurt Hugo Schneider cover of it. Personally I prefer this version to the original.)**

After I put down the note on the conference table of the Sky Army HQ, I ran outside, carrying a bag of supplies such as a diamond sword, diamond armor, a bow, arrows, plenty of cooked food, and wood. After a few minutes of walking, I found a nice shady tree, lied my head on the moss and thought about what I would do. I've lost all my friends. Everyone I cared about no longer means anything. The only people left in the Sky Army were Ty, Ryan, Quentin, Jerome, and three others who I had forgotten the names of. All of the other recruits were either dead, missing, or kidnapped by the squids.

Oh, yes. There was one girl. The day I left, I suppose she had found the note on the table and gone looking for me. The girl had long platinum blonde hair, diamond blue and emerald green mixed eyes, and wore a white tank top with a red and black jacket (with a creeper face on back) over it, black jeans, red sneakers, and red and black headphones. She also wore black and red gloves along with a diamond necklace that had a budder center. When she found me napping under that peaceful tree, the girl came and sat next to me. I woke up to find her there and almost thought that she was the female version of Notch. That surprised me a lot.

"Who are you again?" I cautiously yawned and sat up. She glared at me in strange way.

"You don't recognize me? Come on, you have to remember," she replied. I still couldn't figure it out so she gave up trying to make me guess, "It's Sierra. Sky gave me this necklace." She showed her necklace to me and I could envision the day that Sky handed her that piece of honorary jewelry.

Sierra was one of the head swordmens, or should I say swordswomen, who fought alongside Sky and I in the final battles versus the squids. She did so well in those battles that he presented her a diamond necklace with budder in the middle to show her loyalty to the Sky Army. I clearly remember her face beaming with happiness.

"Jordan, why did you leave?" she asked me. Her face was not as cheerful as usual. Instead she had a look of worrisome that I dreaded on anyone.

"You just won't understand. How old are you anyways?"

"19."

I shrugged my shoulders, and started to lay back down until Sierra pulled me up again.

"Why did you leave?" Now her face turned from worry into anger. I decided not to mess with her.

"I regretted leaving Sky on the battlefield. I saw him in pain and I did nothing to help. Nothing! All I did was wait for others to take the initiative."

"Well Mitch did…" she commented.

"And then _he_ got killed!"

Sierra was silent for a few moments. I thought about how I had said my own words.

"I'm sorry," I continued, "I was being offensive to Mitch. He did what he could. I can't stand the memory of that moment though. That's why I left."

"I understand." Sierra picked herself up and glared at me with little emotion on her face. For a second, I hoped she wouldn't pull out a sword and slice me into pieces. I winced at the idea. Instead she slowly shook her head, "There's nothing I can do, huh?" I forgot the idea of Sierra fighting me. She did not seem in the mood.

I shook my head as well, "Sierra, please let the others read that note as well. For my sake."

"Okay." She smiled and made her way back to HQ. I only sat on the moss watching her leave. I made no motion to go after her or to tell her to join me. I was alone, yet again, and I was to blame.


	3. Chapter 3

**The song for this chapter is: Impossible by Shontelle.**

I let her go. I sat there and just let her leave. What was I doing with my life? I was going nowhere fast.

Hours after wandering in the woods, I spotted two dark mists fly past the corner of my eye. The surroundings were getting darker and mistier as seconds took their toll on the world. My stomach growled so I cautiously grabbed a cookie out of my backpack. I blinked a few times to get the memory of Sky out of my mind but I couldn't focus. One of the mists came closer to my location. I tried backing up but my tunic ended up being stuck to a tree. As I struggled to figure out how to release my shirt, the mist revealed itself as a young man in his mid 20's. The man raced by and stole my cookie. I could faintly hear a voice, this time of a young woman, arguing with the man. The man groaned and slowly walked back to me. The woman finally revealed herself and followed the man to my location. She had long platinum blond hair like Sierra's and icy blue eyes. She wore a yellow and white T-shirt under a black and blue jacket, and black pants. The man had spiky black hair, and amber eyes. He wore a black flame patterned jacket over a white T-shirt and black pants. The woman helped me untangle my shirt.

"I'm sorry about my brother," she said, "My name is Kitty. He's Fury. We're twins but we look and act nothing alike."

"Yeah, you can tell me about that again!" Fury piped up a sarcastic tune, "Kitty's one piece of work!"

Kitty groaned and softly punched her brother. I smirked and giggled for a few moments until she glared at me. Seeing her reaction made the hairs on my back stand up straight.

"So… where are you from?" I asked, trying to make conversation with my new acquaintances.

"We were part of the Audience. Toby Turner," Kitty replied.

"Oh…"

"Fury and I were two of the twelve people from the Audience HQ who did not participate in the war with the Sky Army. When the news finally reached us, we realized all of our friends were dead and Toby was kidnapped by the squids. So we packed all our stuff and headed to a small island off the coast of the HQ. We stayed there until two weeks ago. Ever since then, we've been trying to survive on the things we can find. That's why Fury liked your cookie. He hasn't seen sweets for months."

"Mmm… sweets!" Fury exclaimed.

"Then you can have it." I handed Fury the cookie. He stared at me with a wide mouth and started to bite on the cookie, savoring the sweet flavors of the chocolate.

"Well then, we should probably go," Kitty said. She grabbed Fury's arm and began to walk away.

"Wait!" I yelled. The twins paused and looked back at me picking my bag up from the dirt-stained ground, "Can I join you?"

Fury glanced at Kitty and she nodded.

"Yeah." Kitty smiled and I bounced over to where they were.

It felt as if days had passed. Fury, Kitty and I were well fed, bathed, and with clean clothes. Our armor and weapons were cleaned and shined to perfection. The next thing I remember we sat in a small camp that we had made. It was nighttime and the stars looked like diamonds in the sky. As Fury chomped on the bone of a pork chop, Kitty and I stared up at the stars.

I glanced over in her direction. "Don't they look beautiful?"

"Yeah, they do."

"They remind me of my friends."

"I forgot to ask you… where are you from?"

I cleared my thoughts of everything else and started my story, "My name is Jordan, also known as CaptainSparklez. I am, or was, a recruit of the Sky Army. As one of the first members, I was good friends with Sky himself and the rest of the followers. We battled those evil squids long and hard until…"

"Until what?"

"The final battle. Sky was kidnapped by them. Most of our army was either missing, dead, or captured. I was one of the eight who made it back to Sky Army HQ. Within two days, I could not stand the memory of all of my friends dead, so I left."

"That's harsh."

I remained silent. A few minutes passed. Everything was peaceful and calm.

"Jordan," she told me.

"Yeah?" I relaxed with my head on my backpack.

"It shouldn't be this quiet."

"Why?"

"Fury would usually make some stupid remark about how I'm too smart…" Kitty realized something that made her brow widen in nervousness. "Fury's missing!" She quickly shot up from where she sat and packed her bag and Fury's, which still lied on the dirt. I spotted a footprint stamped into the ground and tapped her shoulder. Once she recognized the footprints were of her brother, we followed the trail.

This trail led us to a giant temple made out of stone. It rose over thirty feet and moss grew around its structure.

"Oh my Notch. This couldn't be… the building… that contains…" Kitty struggled to get out her words.

"The portal to the Aether."

She gasped and raced up the steep stairs and pushed open a door. I rushed up the stairs after her and caught the door before it slammed on my face. As soon as I entered I found Kitty and we started to make our way through dim hallways. A bit frightened, I took two torches from the walls of the hallways and handed one to her. I held a tight grip on the other.

We pulled open a set of doors to find ourselves in a giant room (and I mean _giant_) that was covered in blocks of budder and stone. There were two portals diagonally across from each other. One had a frame of obsidian that was four blocks wide by five blocks tall. The other one had 12 End Portal blocks, organized into a horizontal ring shape five blocks square. On top of each block lied a Eye of Ender.

"He probably went into one of these," Kitty estimated. She turned her attention to the portal with the Eye of Enders on it, "That's it."

"What?"

"The portal to the Aether."

I glimpsed at the stunningly flawless structure. From this, I could tell the it was the Aether. What else would be so immaculate?

"I'll go in this portal. You can go into the other," Kitty nonchalantly demanded. I studied the other portal but once I looked back to her, she was gone.

I carefully slid over to the portal with the obsidian. It seemed divine in a strange way and yet I was too scared to enter. With hope, I plunged into the portal.


	4. Chapter 4

**The song for this chapter is: Skyfall by Adele**

The world around me had changed dramatically. Stone was replaced by Netherbrick. The budder blocks replaced by pools of lava. As soon as I noticed groups of zombie pig men racing around the flooring, I understood that I was in the dimension of the Nether.

I inspected the intricate plan of the layout of the certain area. What I did not notice was the massive castle in the middle of the area. The castle, also built out of Netherbrick, seemed to be the spawn of the zombie pig men.

"What do you think you're doing, breaking into my humble home?!" a loud male voice echoed throughout the surroundings. The voice shocked me so much that I spun to the direction of it and my vision fell on someone I thought I would never meet.

"You're… you're…" I trembled.

"Herobrine. Yes." The king of the Nether stood in his tower on top of the Netherbrick castle. He scanned my figure with his dead white eyes and continued, "And you are?"

"Uh… why would I tell you who I am?"

"Ha! I know you!" My eyes suddenly opened to the thought that Herobrine knew who I was, "You're a recruit of the Sky Army. You've come looking for your precious leader!"

"No… Wait a minute. What do _you_ know about Sky?"

"For one thing, he's with the squids."

"Everyone knows that."

"But he's alive. How could you possibly figure that out?" Herobrine smirked.

"Sky's alive?!"

"Yes indeed. I see you want him back."

"Of course!"

"Alright. If you complete the favor I give you, I will tell the squids to release him."

"What kind of favor?" I queried.

"I want you to find the One with the Golden Necklace and bring her to me."

"She's…?"

"An old friend." Herobrine shooed me off, "Now you may leave. And remember I'll be watching you…"

He mysteriously vanished when I blinked. Not figuring out how he completed this action, I spotted a portal and ran into it. I ended back in the stone building covered in budder.

Kitty sat in one of the corners, alone. I slowly walked over to the corner and crouched next to her. Her pale skin was stained with dried tears. More fresh ones streamed down her cheeks.

"I didn't find him. Fury is gone," she cried.

"No luck in the Nether either," Kitty didn't seem to be pay any attention to me, "Listen, we can find your brother. I promise…"

"No! He's gone! I've looked everywhere!"

"Everywhere?"

"Yes." She stood and grabbed her bags. We made our way outside the building. Kitty wiped her tears and glanced around at the tall trees that stood in our path to Fury.

"Let's keep on going," I told her. She shyly nodded and followed me into the forestry.

Eventually we ran into a dead end with trees too close to each other.

"Damn it," I whispered, "Where now?"

"You need some help?" a voice asked from behind us. Kitty and I spun to encounter a girl around my age with black hair, royal blue eyes, and wearing blue jeans and a black T-shirt, "You two seem lost. Going on a date or something?"

"No, no. We are definitely not on a date!" Kitty told the girl, "But I can say that we're lost. See I'm trying to find…"

"Come with me," the girl interrupted. I shrugged and followed the girl. Kitty rolled her eyes and lagged behind.

The girl, Kitty, and I ended up in a small campsite. The area was on flatland with a farm next to it. Not many people were visible. There were only two teenage boys farming and three others strolling around.

"So what is this place?" I questioned the girl.

"You're at the HQ of the Illusionists. By the way, my name is Beatrice."

"Huh? The Illusionists?"

"Yeah."

"The Illusionists went missing for over three years."

"Where'd you hear that?"

"Sky Army."

"Explains it. Sky was keeping our group a secret cause he thought we were threatening. Threaten my butt!" Beatrice picked up the pace of her walking and led us to a building taller than the others in the camp. She opened the door for Kitty and almost shut it on my face, again. I opened it to find about six people already sitting at a long conference table. They all stared at me. Beatrice and Kitty sat in chairs near the back wall. I nervously joined them and placed a chair next to Beatrice.

"Do you have something against me?" I whispered in her ear.

"No of course not," she replied.

"Then why…"

"Cause I don't like Sky. That's it."

"Nothing else."

She turned her chair to face me. "You seem like a nice guy. So I won't be harsh to you. But when I see your leader, he's…"

Beatrice's eye began to turn blank white. She became angrier and angrier as she thought about Sky. The white eyes reminded me of someone else. Herobrine.

"Is there anything that you haven't told me yet?" I carefully investigated her.

Quickly her eyes transformed from the white into turquoise.

"How did you do that?" I asked her in shock. From what I remembered, her eyes were dark blue.

"My eyes change with my emotions. No big deal." Beatrice commented and turned her chair to face the conference table. I hoped she wasn't lying.

Half an hour later, Beatrice took us out of the conference room. She introduced me to a young woman by the name of Susan. She had flowing brown hair, shining brown eyes and wore a stylish Tardis dress.

Susan told about herself. She was also part of the Sky Army but not as well known as some of the others. After the final battle, she realized that her leader who she was so devoted to had been kidnapped by the squids. Although she wanted to take revenge on her enemies, she did not have the strength to complete her task. So instead of going to the squid dimension, Susan took a wrong turn on her path and ran into the camp of the Illusionists. She met Beatrice, the former executive leader, and she was allowed into the group.

"And that's why I'm here," Susan concluded.

"Wow," I responded, "You were that desperate for Sky that you attempted to go into the squid dimension by yourself?!"

"Not quite. I tried asking Quentin to assemble a group to help me but he replied that there were only _so_ many people left. And then I went to Ty. Ty's response was worse. He told me that Sky was missing and would never return. That burnt out my heart. So I stormed out of HQ and made my way to the portal to the squid dimension."

"Ty could have been a little more… sensitive."

"I know!" Susan sighed and leaned back on her wooden seat.

"Are you going to go back?"

"What's the use? I'm happy here."

I stood up and stared down at her.

"What are you doing?" she asked.

"You don't need any help so I'll just be going on my way." I started walking away, hoping that she would call out.

"Wait!" I faced Susan and saw her standing still. She glanced at her feet while taking peeks at me, "Can you stay… for just a little while more?"

"Susan, I'm sorry. I'm with my friend and we're trying to find her brother… I just can't stay."

"Okay," she smiled and the only person I saw was Sierra. For some reason I couldn't get her out of my mind. She had haunted me ever since I last ran into her under that tree. I never wanted to forget that moment. Suddenly my thoughts were interrupted by Susan, "Jordan? You there?"

"Yeah!" I perked up. She and I made our way back to the center of Illusionists HQ. I met up with Kitty and we packed our things. Beatrice and Susan waited at the path where Kitty and I would part our own ways. As soon as we arrived, Beatrice pulled me aside from the two girls.

"Remember when we were sitting in the conference earlier today?"

"Yeah."

"And you asked me if there was anything that I wasn't revealing to you?"

"Yes… where are you going with this…"

"I'm Herobrine's daughter."


	5. Chapter 5

**The song for this chapter is: Inseparable by the Jonas Brothers.**

**If there is no text for POV, then it is Jordan's. Whoever else has POV text (such as Sierra POV) is that certain character.**

Beatrice POV

I recognized the expression on Jordan's face. He was frightened for his life. I had a secret past that no one should have known of. But that all went away when I met Jordan. At first I couldn't trust him due to his alliance with the Sky Army. Within the few hours that I spent with him, though, I realized that he could take the truth. He seemed strong enough.

I explained that I was sent out from my father, Herobrine, the King of the Nether, years ago to get rid of the Sky Army. So I became a recruit and fought against the squids. After one of their last battles, I couldn't take the pressure and left. Although Herobrine had been searching for me for years, I traveled to the Illusionists and became the executive leader since I was very intelligent, clever, and skilled at planning scams. Soon enough, the Illusionists started to gain more representatives such as Susan.

"What?!" Jordan fiercely asked, "You're…"

I covered his mouth before he could say anything else, "Herobrine's daughter. You can stop obsessing over it."

"Oh my Notch. You have a handful for a father."

"And how would you know that?" I questioned him.

"Last night, I wandered into the Nether. Herobrine caught me by surprise and asked me to do a favor for him."

I started to get interested. "And that favor was?"

"To find the One with the Golden Necklace and bring her to him."

"The One with the Golden Necklace…" I studied Jordan's words, "Did he give you a specific name?"

"Nope."

"Strange."

"He told me that Sky would be released."

I paused my thought, "Sky? Released?"

"After the final battle, he was captured by the squids. No one has heard of him since," Jordan said, "But when your father mentioned that he was still alive, I decided to accept his favor."

"You do know that sealing a deal with Herobrine is like…. sealing a deal with Herobrine. You just don't make a deal with him at all!"

"It was for Sky. He was one of my best friends, in reality."

"You know Jordan, I pity you."

"Why?"

"You would go that far to save someone."

Jordan stiffened his face and didn't say a word. All he did is look at me one last time and walk off to Kitty. I chose not to follow him. He had enough issues already.

Sierra POV

No matter what, I wouldn't let him get into trouble. And I knew trouble, especially from experience. Once I heard about Sky's capture by the squids from those who where at its specific location, the event traumatized me to the point that I had no one to turn to… except Jordan. He was the closest to Sky and the only one who could end my misery when I was sad. Whenever I saw him fooling around with Ryan and Ty during the wars against the squids, he always brightened up the recruits's view of the future as well as mine. In order to keep him from getting hurt from my enemies, I went searching for him although he told me specifically not to.

I wandered around the woods, trying to focus my mind on saving Jordan from the dangers that lied in front of him. Hours later, I slowly and desperately realized I had no food or water. Feeling lightheaded, I started to find my vision hazy. With no more strength left, I collapsed on the ground.

"Are you okay!?" I eventually heard a male voice say in my ear, "Snowy, give her water."

"On it, buddy!" a female voice replied to the other's request.

"I told you not to call me that! My name is not buddy for crying out loud!" the first voice reprimanded the second.

I was finally given a gulp of liquid. This allowed me to open my eyes, sit up, rub my forehead and take a first glance at the people who had rescued me. The male voice turned out to be a boy who had black, spiky hair, a green shirt and brown pants, and eyes that reminded me of a hawk. He glared down at me with complete and utter sympathy. The girl that crouched next to him had pale skin with Diamond-colored hair that slightly went over the right side of her blue eyes. Also her ears were covered by white headphones with blue speakers. She wore a light blue t-shirt with the letters "XD" on them, white capris and a set of blue tie-dye converse.

"You feeling any better?" the boy asked me.

"Yeah…" I grumbled, "Do you have any food…?"

He already had laid a slice of watermelon on the ground next to me. I picked up the watermelon and took a bite out of it.

"Thank you," I told him, my mouth half full of fruit.

"I'm Snowy! Short for… uh… Snowy!" The girl sarcastically grinned, "This is my buddy…"

The boy angrily glared at Snowy. She winced back a little but shook it off. He continued her sentence, "Yosh. My name is Yosh."

"Nice to meet you two." I advanced to stand up but Snowy sat me down again.

"You have to chill! In a hurry or something? In a world like this, you can never hurry… except racing away from those dumb squids!"

"You've heard of the squids?"

"Yeah! I was part of a group called the Illusionists. You probably haven't heard of them. They pretty much pull pranks for a living! Sounds fun right?! Ha! No way!" She smirked and rolled her eyes, "The Illusionists had a leader named Wolf. He was… what you would say… vampire-like. Bloodthirsty…but for the blood of squids. Wolf had a cool and calm personality during meetings and stuff like that. When it came to a war or battle, though, he was the first one to join. Eventually Sky had to kick the group of the alliance because of his behaviors. Cheap, right?"

"Wow. Seems like that was one heck of a group."

Snowy turned to Yosh, "Do you know about the squids?!"

"Don't say it so loud. Oh course. But you never heard this from me, kapeesh?" I nodded and Yosh motioned for Snowy to come closer. He was about to reveal a shocking past to us.

Yosh was part of the Homies, or the army of xXSlyFoxHoundXx. Sly's group was allies with Sky's and fought in the first few battles against the squids. Eventually, their numbers grew smaller as each time their armory and weaponry decreased dramatically. They backed out of the war and tried rebuilding their group but it was too late. Sly had been kidnapped and almost killed by the squids in front of Yosh and two others. It affected the rest of the war's outcome. Majority of the army was killed and Sly's third in line to leader got his old position. This new leader seemed to pay no attention to any political leadership at all. She often was influenced by mythology and stories. One of these stories, however, almost got Yosh killed, leading her to hate him. In fury, he took Sly's trusted Slime Sword, presented to him by Sly himself, and escaped the new unequal environment. After wandering the forests for about a month, he ran into Snowy who begged to join him. He hesitantly accepted her request.

"And that's how I met Snowy," Yosh concluded, "Again, _you did not hear this from me_."

"Got it," Snowy sarcastically responded. She turned to me and whispered, "He could definitely need a chill pill. Story's not even funny."

Yosh somehow overheard this comment. "It wasn't supposed to be funny! It was the story of my life! For Notch's sake!"

"I say that we part our separate ways. I need to find my friend who ran away… maybe you've met him. His name is Jordan…"

"Haven't heard of him," Yosh instantly snapped. He stood up and made Snowy help me up, "Goodbye."

"Come on, buddy. Can we keep her, please?" Snowy sweetly asked. This created so much tension in Yosh's expression that his face turned bright red.

"If you don't call me buddy ever again, she can come."

"Fine." She turned to me with a giant smile on her face and led me to Yosh. We began our journey to find my old friend.


	6. Chapter 6

**The song for this chapter is: Vida la Vida by Coldplay.**

**Now back to Jordan.**

"I'm leaving. Fury is my brother. He's my responsibility."

Kitty spun around toward the trees and took a deep breath.

"But I've been with you for so long. You now tell me that I can't help?!" I nervously asked her. She faced me once again.

"Jordan, I need to find Fury. I don't want to lag behind…"

"I'm causing you to lag?! This is absurd!"

"So glad I met you. Now I must go." She kept a straight face while beginning her journey into the trees. If I raced up to meet her, she would tell me to go away. There was no way I could stay with Kitty. So I let her leave, like all my other potential friends.

Once Beatrice noticed Kitty was gone, she slid her way over to me, "Need some more help?"

"No," I annoyingly replied.

"I know a place besides the Illusionists that you can go for support."

I started to gain interest, "You do?"

"Yeah. The only problem is that the only way you can get through over to their camp is blocked by a battle-to-the-death arena. All people who want to visit them need to survive the "hunger games" type battle."

"Why do you want to send to a group that I may not make it alive to?"

"Cause they're the best of the best."

"You so sure?"

"Yep." She charmingly nodded and pushed me towards the woods to the right of their camp, "Straight that way and you should hit the arena."

I glanced back and saw her eyes turn from dark teal to mint green. They became sky blue for a split second, causing me to think about Sierra.

"I'm not so sure…"

"Trust me." Beatrice grinned in a devious Herobrine way. Like father like daughter.

She waved me off and smiled as I left. Once I could barely make out the Illusionists' camp, Beatrice had turned her back and strut into the conference room.

"Think about it. Maybe you can find someone you know and team up with them," I whispered to myself. Strolling through the now-peaceful forestry, my mind was able to relax and think of other incidences where I didn't lose a friend. At this moment, I realized why Beatrice sent me to this "new" group. She knew that I would win the battle-to-the-death and actually make it across to the other side. And once I arrived, the new group would appreciate my accomplishment and give me more respect on their first impression.

My thoughts were interrupted by an arrow zooming past my head. Surprised, I spun around to watch it fly by but another one nearly hit my elbow. Nervous and shocked, I returned to face the direction I was recently in and spotted a girl with rainbow hair and brown eyes wearing a black hoodie with smily face creeper on the back, and white shorts. Her ears were covered by black headphones. She held a bow in her right hand.

"You gonna fight back or not?" she unwelcomingly asked, "This _is_ a one-man standing battle."

"Uh… yeah. I guess." I replied. Struggling to grab my diamond sword out of my bag, I noticed the girl, who looked only seventeen, roll her eyes and walk over to help me.

Once I had out my sword, she returned to her position and aim her bow at my face, "Okay, now this is going to be a fair battle. Only I'm going to win."

I smirked and ran in towards her but when she shot the arrow, it almost hit me. I jinxed the girl and ran around, leading her to believe I was in her back. As she pulled out an iron axe, she swung into thin air. To trick her, I had ran to her left side and knocked her down with the handle of my sword.

"Alright," she gasped for air, "You got me there. You're good." The girl stood up, "But please don't kill me. If we team up, there will be a better chance that we can both get out of here alive."

"I didn't want to kill you anyways."

"Oh… well… good. I'm iEcho by the way." She put out her hand for me to shake and I took the offer.

"Nice to meet you. I'm Jordan."

"Wait a minute… you're not CaptainSparklez… are you?"

"Yeah, I actually am."

"Oh my Notch! I had no idea! I'm sorry I ever tried to kill you in the first place!"

"It's okay, it's okay. All we have to do is get rid of everyone else. I'm trying to get to this group across from the arena. I'm not sure what it's called but I heard about it from my friend Beatrice of the Illusionists."

"The Illusionists?"

I nodded and glanced around for any possible enemies. Finding no one, I concealed my sword, "So why are you here? And how do you know me?"

"Well, it's a long story."

Searching our surroundings once more and spotting no one, I chuckled, "I think we have time."

iEcho grinned and continued, "See, I technically still am a recruit of the Sky Army. I was on the front line of the final battle. Ant and Jason were fighting next to me. To escape the grasp of about four squids, I ran over to Sky's location. I noticed he was struggling against a larger, superior squid with Mitch. Trying to help him, I rushed over and beat down the squid with my budder sword. Sky thanked me but did not catch a eye on another squid that grabbed him from the back. I attempted to chop off one of the squid's tentacles, and that I was able to do. Unfortunately, he had about six left. Mitch ran at the squid but was knocked down. He eventually stood up yet again and daringly rushed at it. The squid's friend, who was hiding in the shadows, slashed Mitch with his own sword. Devastated at Mitch's dead body lying at my feet, I tried once again to free Sky but was caught myself."

I already was shocked at her story but it seemed she was not finished.

"Everyone who had not fled or died was sent to the squid dimension, including myself. We were put in prisons of around sixteen people each. Sky, of course, was the only one who got a private cell. Hopeless and without any freedom, a friend of mine in the same cell as me spotted a hole in the wall which would easily free the smaller people. I volunteered to leave and get help, which was successful. Well, I left, but… I came back a minute later and peeked through a crack. From what I saw, the rest of my cellmates were being transported by the squids into another area, or even possible death. I don't know. What I do know is that the squids knew that someone had escaped. They could't have found out it was me though. That would have been impossible. I exited the squid dimension with only a few minor injuries. I've been wandering these forests ever since."

"So you were a captive of the squids and you survived?"

"I guess that's what you can call it."

We suddenly heard leaves crackle in the near distance. A trio of archers surrounded us within fifteen seconds. They were packed with iron armor and seemed arrogant with power. What did we do then? I ran at one of them with my diamond sword and iEcho rushed at another one with her bow and arrows. Those two were easily defeated. The last one, a young man, however was still standing. A loud bong rang out with sound, which hurt our ears. Seconds later, we were transported to final death-match.


	7. Chapter 7

**The song for this chapter is: Radioactive by Imagine Dragons (either the original or the Lindsey Stirling cover).**

iEcho stood on a platform next to me. The man we were fighting was on a different platform across from hers. He had night sky black hair and purple eyes. He wore a dark grey shirt under a black trench coat (with white inside), and red pants. Across from me an unfamiliar girl positioned herself to advance an attack. She had short red hair, grass green eyes, and wore a black hoodie, jeans, and black trainers. On her wrist I noticed she also had imprinted a tattoo of a black and grey dragon.

The man glared over at the girl, "Ember, I see we meet again." She annoyingly glanced in his direction.

"I know," the girl groaned, "Wolf."

"That's it? You're not going to say that since I'm the chief of the Illusionists, your worst enemy, you're going to kill me?"

Ember had her focus on my eyes. It really creeped me out. But something else caught my attention.

"You're the chief of the Illusionists?" I cautiously asked the man, who's name was Wolf.

"Yes. And Ember over here is _my_ worst enemy, at least I believe so. She's the current leader of the Homies."

iEcho glared down at her feet and I heard her whisper, "Sounds familiar."

Another bong noise went off, allowing the battle to commence. Ember sprinted to use her TNT and blow up my head. But when I apprehended that it was about to blast, I quickly rushed over to Wolf, who got stuck fighting iEcho. While she sped to charge Ember, I glimpsed him pull out a enchanted Sharpness II diamond sword.

"Oh no, this is not good," I thought to myself, "If he uses that against my plain diamond sword, I'll be dead in seconds." He stormed toward me with his sword. With no other options, I used the same maneuver that I undertook with iEcho. Instead of knocking him down with the handle of the sword, the blade accidentally slit him upon the throat. His shocked purple eyes stared into mine for a split second until he collapsed to his death.

All I did I was look down in disturbance. I had killed many people before, but this time felt different. This man was Beatrice's chief. She was one of my closest friends and had trusted me with the truth. How could I have done this…?

Slowly emerging from my thoughts, I eyed iEcho on her knees, her axe thrown three feet away, and Ember about to plunge a knife into her back. Quickly, I took hold of Wolf's enchanted diamond sword and dashed to Ember. In one single slice, she was on the ground gasping because of lost blood and oxygen. The last thing she saw was me holding the sword above her head.

Relieved, iEcho ran over and hugged me, "Thank you! She was gonna kill me!" I remained silent.

"Jordan?" she sympathetically asked, "You okay?"

"Yeah," I calmly replied, "Just a little traumatic. Haven't killed anything… important… besides squids."

"They were important?"

"At least Wolf was." I sheathed my new sword and tiptoed into the woods, towards the camp. iEcho slowly followed behind.

I still remember that very moment ever since. Beatrice had actually helped me in some ways. She had taught me how important friends are and that you should never let them leave. For some reason, I didn't want to go to the other group's camp. I thought about returning to Sky Army HQ. "We were too close now to go back," I murmured to myself so iEcho couldn't hear, "Sierra is just gonna have to wait."

"I miss Sky," iEcho said. She stopped walking, "If he was here, he would have done what was right."

I did not reply. She had accidentally brought the horrible memories. At this moment, I remembered those accurate events during the battle. It was just as iEcho had told me. I even retained the memory that she was there and tried to save Sky. Mitch had attacked the giant squid and unfortunately his sword got taken by it. He was killed by another squid that was close by. I was only a few feet away from this occurrence with Jerome, Ant, and Jason. Jerome dropped down to his knees in devastation when he noticed Mitch dead and the others rushed to attack the squid but all failed. Both Ant and Jason were killed by other squids. I, on the other side, went after the one that held Sky. Eventually, they came to the portal of the squid dimension. I did not dare to enter with them so I returned to the battlefield. Only Ty, Ryan, Quentin, Jerome, Sierra, Susan, one other boy, and I were alive from the Sky Army. Others were alive as well but they were not originally from our group.

I was interrupted when I heard a loud scream. Spinning to face my friend, I landed my vision on two teenage kids, one with his mouth over iEcho's and the other, her bow aimed at my chest. The boy looked like a black creeper. The girl had black hair, ender-man eyes, wore a long black dress to cover black swirls going down her legs. I put up my arms in surrender.

We were bound by ropes and taken to a camp in the opposite direction than my destination. The camp was not as visually angelic as the Illusionists, but it was provocative. Vines strung down from all of the buildings and I noticed most of the population of the group had features similar to our captors with dark hair and black clothes. As we entered a building larger than the others, I caught my eye of three familiar figures sitting on kingly stone chairs. Within thirty seconds, I recognized who they were. I was absolutely shocked.

"Ian?! Mat?! Preston?!"

**Just to let you guys know, if you decide to submit an OC, please post it as a review. It is so much easier for me and you will probably see your own sooner. Thanks!**


	8. Chapter 8

**The song for this chapter is: Quiet from Matilda the Musical (By the way, this certain song choice was inspired by Lilkinny's **_**Choices We All Need to Make**_** series because she used a lot of Matilda songs in it).**

"Jordan!" Mat leaped up from his chair and ran to greet me. He glared at the teenagers, "Endercreeper, Enera, you can release these two." They untied us. I rubbed my wrists to relieve myself of the pain. iEcho just took a look around the interior of the building.

"How'd you get here?" Preston asked us.

"Well, I was searching for your neighboring group…"

"We don't have any neighbor groups," Mat quickly responded, "It's just us."

Speechless, I glanced over at iEcho, who had also heard this comment.

"Why are you not with the Sky Army?" I asked.

"Shh…" Ian hastened to my location and hushed me, "We prefer not to say that _name_ in this territory."

"Who? Sky?"

All three shushed me this time.

"What is the problem with Sky?" I angrily whispered to them.

Mat explained, "After the final battle, Jerome came to Ian and I. He said that Mitch, Ant, and Jason were dead and you-know-who was kidnapped by those _damn_ squids. Frightened that they may come after us, we fled the battlefield like chickens and ran into the woods. I am not proud of that. Luckily, we came across four friendly people not involved in the war who took us in and healed our wounds. Eventually we gained their trust enough to create a separate new group called the Enderdragons. We're not really Endermen or dragons, but it scared lots of invaders. They gathered more people to join the Enderdragons. To keep our area safe, we send recruits to secure the boundaries and make sure that no one sneaks in with anything that could harm us. We haven't told anyone about our pasts so they don't know about you."

"How did Preston get here then?"

"I noticed these two cactuses were missing," Preston elaborated on Mat's story, "So I wandered into the woods looking for them and finally detected Ian and Mat with some guys they found. I decided to stay out of their way for a little while and waited in the forest for two weeks. It was on the recruits' first intruder search that they found me and turned me in. Since I was friends with their new commanders, I joined in on the Enderdragons as well. All three of us share the same position as leaders of the rest of them."

"You never told me why you won't say _you-know-who's_ name."

"Sky, Ty, Kermit, Seth, Noah, and Ryan were hated by these people. Years ago, replicas of them stormed the village that our followers lived in and took over everything. In reality, the real ones were fighting the battles against the squids," Ian told me.

"Strange. Like a trick?" I queried.

"Exactly. But who would do such a thing like that to_ innocent people_?"

Those words triggered my short-term memory. I came to the realization that I knew who the tricksters were. The Illusionists.

Mat had told me there was no other group neighboring them. I believed him more than a girl that I had only known for three hours. Why would I ever have trusted her? She most likely was leading me to a trap for her father. If this was true, she would never gain my trust back again.

A small black cat with gray paws and tail crept over to Preston and rubbed its head against his leg. Another cat, black with gray spots, followed the first cat and repeated its actions.

"These two… I've named them Mistey and Night… have been stuck to me the whole time I've been here. It's crazy!"

Mistey, the one with the gray tail, started to climb Preston like a tree. Ian and Mat laughed hysterically. iEcho and I eventually giggled along.

"Not funny!" Preston cried. One of the recruits pulled Mistey off of him and another one took Night. He punched Mat and Ian on their arms.

"Ow!" they touched their sore arms in unison.

"That's what you get!" Preston couldn't hold in his laughter so all three of them were on the ground holding their stomachs. iEcho and I just looked down with giant smiles on our faces. We were glad that we found someone who we could finally trust.

Later that day, Mat introduced me to all of his recruits and showed me around the camp. iEcho seemed to be getting together well with Preston. Ian just ran around, as the group's source of entertainment.

"Mat!" a girl who wore a purple leather jacket and black trousers hurried to him. She had black hair with purple and red highlights. She was scared for her life.

"Void? What's wrong?"

"They're back! The invaders!"

"What!" Mat led me back into their personal building and met back up with iEcho and Preston, "We have a little bit of a problem."

"Huh?" iEcho asked, "What kind of problem?"

Mat pointed outside the window. I realized what was happening. Replicas of Sky, Ty, Kermit, Seth, Noah, and Ryan scorched the roads of the camp with fear. They started beating up the innocent villagers and burning down the wooden buildings. Shocked, I spotted the replica of Sky. He created a grin on his face that I could recognize anywhere and on anyone. Beatrice.

Ian finally ran into the building, shivering, and held tightly onto Preston.

"Dude, what's wrong?" he asked Ian.

"There's a spy here!"

Mat shot up, "Who?!"

"Vo… Void!"

"Damn it. She must have told them that we were here!"

I still couldn't believe that Beatrice would have been that mean. Furious, I quickly rushed outside.

"Jordan!" iEcho called out. She advanced to join me, but Preston held her back.

Outside I passed the replicas of Seth and Ty and made my way to Beatrice. I tapped her on the shoulder.

"Uh…" she gaped her mouth open and tried to ignore me.

"How could you do this!" I screamed at her, "I honestly thought I could trust you."

"Why are you here?" she asked in Sky's voice.

"The bigger question is: Why the Nether are you here?!"

"It's my father… he…"

"He what?"

"Wanted you dead. From our spy, Void, we got information that two new people had joined the Enderdragons and she described you and a girl. Herobrine doesn't want you to succeed in your mission. He only wants the squids to kill the real Sky and the One with the Golden Necklace."

I remained silent for a few moments, trying to figure out my surroundings, "Why should I believe you?"

"When I told you about that group across the way, it wasn't true. I knew that my father was going to be visiting the Illusionists so I wanted you as far away as possible."

"So you were _protecting_ me?"

"Yes. I hopefully was."

"I have a solution. If you stop invading this village disguised as my friends, then I'll… go back to the Illusionists with you."

"My father will catch you."

"I know. That's the point."

Beatrice thought about this, "Fine." She motioned a signal to regroup the Illusionists, "We're heading out."

Looking inside the building, I saw iEcho, Preston, Mat, and Ian anxiously stare at me as Beatrice tied my hands together. They led me away from the camp of the Enderdragons and into the forest.

Two questions still lingered in my head: How would I rescue Sky if there were so many distractions along the way? and Who is the One with the Golden Necklace?

**Who is good? Evil? Trustworthy? And who the Nether is the One with the Golden Necklace?! Use the past chapters and try to figure this tricky situation out before Herobrine does! Muahaha! All will soon be found out...**


	9. Chapter 9

**The song for this chapter is: This Time by Pia Toscano.**

**This chapter has a lot of plot twists: so be _prepared_.**

Sierra POV

Snowy, Yosh, and I were exploring a new territory. Yosh eventually smelled smoke coming from a close location.

"I think something's on fire around here," he told us.

"Forest fire, most likely. There are so many fires that it could be a grill-off with big fat guys eating bacon!" Yosh and I just stared at her, "What? I was using _metaphors_!"

He rolled his eyes and continued on toward the area with the smoke. We came upon a burnt-down village. There were people running around with medical supplies, trying to revive those who laid on the ground. One girl in particular caught my eye.

"iEcho?!" The girl turned towards me. I was positively sure she was my long-lost friend. She ran to me and we hugged, "I haven't seen you in forever! What are you doing here?"

She told me about Sky's capture, Mitch's death, and wandering around the woods, "Then I ran into Jordan…"

"Jordan? The CaptainSparklez Jordan?"

"Yeah. He helped me win the battle-to-the-death. He was trying to find some group near the arena that really didn't exist. We got kidnapped by these two teenagers who took us here. Turns out it's the Enderdragons, led by Mat, Ian, and Preston. A group of invaders that looked exactly like some of the recruits from the Sky Army, including Sky himself, came and they took him."

"Where is he now?"

"No idea."

Nervous, I glanced around. I turned to Yosh and Snowy, "You guys, please stay here. I need to go and find my friend."

iEcho piped in, "I'm coming too!" I acknowledged her by nodding.

"Sierra, you know we can't stay," Yosh mentioned.

"Why not?"

"We… or at least I… am a wanderer. I can't stay in one place for a long amount of time."

I sighed, "If you want to join us, then you can. If not, please be safe. The last thing I want is another one of my friends being kidnapped and killed."

"I want to come!" Snowy cheered, "Sounds fun."

Yosh glanced over at Snowy, "She goes, I go."

"Alright," I said, "Let's head out."

"Wait," iEcho stopped me, "I need to say goodbye to Preston." She ran over to Mat, Ian, and Preston and hugged all of them. I couldn't hear what they said to each other, but it honestly did not matter. In the last split second, I noticed Preston lean over and kiss her. iEcho smiled and hurried back to Yosh, Snowy, and I. There was still a big smile on her face. This made me miss Jordan even more.

Kitty POV **(Sorry her POV is so short. But she'll show up again sooner or later. Also thanks to one of the guests for giving me this plot line.)**

I walked through the thick forestry wondering if I was ever going to see my brother again. Out of nowhere, an arrow flew by my head. I cautiously went towards it. On the arrow there was a note. It read, "You will never find your brother for he saw what you cannot. He is in my captivity. I hope you die, Oblivion."

"Oh no," I thought, "She's back."

Fury's POV

I walked into an end portal. Landing on a hard substance called end stone, I glanced up and standing before me was Kitty's mortal enemy, Oblivion. I picked myself up and started run as fast as I could but she was faster, catching up to me in mere seconds! Alone and afraid I brought out my trusty void sword.

"Fury, Fury, Fury," Oblivion stopped me once I reached a dead end, "Thought you could be safe because of your precious sister. Well, once you're mine, I'll have her and your new friend! Muahaha!"

"You mean Jordan?"

"I don't know his name. I don't care. I just want _him_!"

"Why are you back?"

"Herobrine helped me out. He said if I killed your friend that he could give me all the diamonds I wanted."

"So you would kill to get diamonds?" I asked, extremely confused.

"Yes, you imbecile! Diamonds are priceless in this world. Whoever has them can get some _real_ money."

I growled, "No one is gonna touch me, Kitty, or Jordan!"

"Oh, you think so?" In one single move, Oblivion knocked me out and dragged me away.

Beatrice POV

Once back at Illusionists HQ, I, undisguised, sat a seemingly hopeless Jordan down on a bench in the conference room. I untied his hands.

"I thought I was your captive," he commented.

"Technically you are, but I told you that I liked you. As a friend, of course." He stayed quiet, "I'm sorry. Had I have known that Void was telling the truth…"

"You thought she was lying to you?"

I nodded, "She usually does. Void is one of my father's favorites. She does everything for him."

"Such as…?"

"A spy for the Enderdragons! Herobrine would have placed me in that position if he had known better!"

"When I was back here earlier, you told me that he doesn't know that you're with the Illusionists."

"Uh… that wasn't true…" I nervously told him, "He told me to go after you… and then Void mentioned you were with their group. After I quit the Sky Army, I joined the Illusionists, who actually all are spies of Herobrine. Even Susan, believe it or not. I hope she told you the truth."

"I'm pretty sure she did. It sounded truthful."

I sighed, "Around here, you never know."

A loud boom was heard from outside. Jordan and I rushed out of the conference room to find the explosion had blown up a hole in the camp's center. A group of people surrounded our recruits. One boy stepped forward, most likely a representative. He had fair skin, neat brown hair, light blue eyes, and wore headphones around his neck. Also, he wore a red jacket over a black creeper shirt and blue pants.

"Beatrice," he cried out, "I know that the Illusionists killed Ember."

"What?! No. Wolf was killed out there!"

"He must have slashed her before someone else got him. But you and your group had better be on the look-out. Now the Homies know that you had something to do with our leader's death. So, I, Chris, will be the new commander. And I will do a better job than Ember has ever done." The Homies cheered him on. I groaned and rolled my eyes.

"First of all, _Chris_, I have no idea about Ember's death. If she did get killed by Wolf, it was _his_ actions. Don't bring it out on my group."

"I'll bring it out on you, _daughter of Herobrine_."

I angrily growled at him, "How did you freaking find out?!"

He smirked, "I have personnel on the inside." Susan grinned and determinedly walked over to the Homies.

"No…" Jordan struggled to get out his words, "Not Susan..."

"I lied to all of you!" she yelled out, "I'm not part of the stupid Sky Army. All along I was with the Homies and we're going to rule the whole forest under Chris's command. Ember was just a sucker for our stories. She believed everything we told her. That's how we ran out all the people who could bring us down! Long live Sly!"


	10. Chapter 10

**The song for this chapter is: The Other Side by Jason Derulo (I prefer the cover by Max Schneider and Keke Palmer).**

**Since this is Chapter 10, I have decided that it would be special… you will see…**

I honestly couldn't stand all the people who I had thought I trusted betray me in one way or another. For a moment, I thought I would surrender to Herobrine himself. No… I needed to find my old friends and protect them.

With no second thoughts, I raced out of Illusionists HQ. Chris happened to spot me, "He's trying to get away! After him!" All of the Homies hurried after me. Beatrice and the Illusionists followed them.

I ran as fast as I could away from the situation. As I turned to look behind me, I bumped into someone. I faced the person to notice Kitty.

I looked up into the sky, "Thank you Notch!" I turned to her, "Listen, I seriously need your help…"

"I do too! My mortal enemy Oblivion has captured Fury and I _have_ to find her."

"I'll help you. As long as…" I spun around to notice the Homies and the Illusionists heading closer to me. I grabbed Kitty's hand and led her in a different direction. However, the groups still were on my tail. We ended up in the camp of the Enderdragons.

Ian, Mat, and Preston rushed to meet up with me.

"Jordan. What happened?!" Mat nervously asked me.

"It's a long story. I just need you to keep me away from…" Before I said my last words, the Homies reached the HQ. Beatrice and the Illusionists entered moments later.

"Chris," Beatrice warned, "If you dare hurt him…"

"Tell me what happened," Mat quietly demanded.

At this moment, another group came into the camp. It was Sierra, iEcho, and two others who I did not recognize.

"Jordan!" Sierra exclaimed. When I saw her, I found the diamond and budder necklace around her neck. _Sierra_ was the One with the Golden Necklace.

Chris paid attention to Sierra and took hold of her arm. He placed his sword up to her throat, "Surrender yourself or I'll kill her."

"You wouldn't," I snarled.

He brought it closer to her skin, "Try me."

"I would rather surrender to _Herobrine_."

"What did you say?!" a loud familiar voice boomed out.

"I would rather surrender to Herobrine."

The King of the Nether appeared out of thin air. He stood in the middle of all of the groups.

"Somehow you have figured out my plans. I had planned to kill Sky and the One with the Golden Necklace. Sky, as your leader, wouldn't have lasted a day if it weren't up to me. He lost his own necklace anyways. I figured out that he gave it to some girl to protect it from me. And as for the girl, I've been trying to find her for years."

I quickly shot a glance at Sierra and then placed my thoughts back on Herobrine, "I'll give up myself for the One with the Golden Necklace and Sky's freedoms."

"Ha, you would do that?"

"Of course." I angrily glared up at him.

"If you say so."

Sky, beat up, covered in bruises, and bleeding in several places, materialized next to him. Everyone gasped. All of the current and former Sky Army recruits besides for me: Sierra, iEcho, Preston, Ian, and Mat hastened to help him.

Herobrine walked up to me and took me by the hand, "Off to the Nether we go, Mr. Sparklez."

* * *

I'm in the Nether. Hundreds of zombie pig men try to smack me with their gold swords. Red, hot, fiery lava surrounds my feet. Herobrine, the godly man of fire, smirks from his nether brick castle as I start to burn. In a rage of hope I leap from the lava and sprint to a portal. Before I go through, however, more zombie pig men attack me from all directions. One happens to finally get his arm on mine. The other pig men drag me to Herobrine and force me on my knees. One moment and my life is gone.

This is where the story ends. This is where I finally fall to Herobrine, my one and only enemy. But not today. Not today.

"This cannot happen to me," I thought. Before he chopped my head with his sword, I determinedly jumped up and made my way to the portal. This time the zombie pig men did not catch me. I slipped through the portal and back into the real world. Quickly, I met up with Beatrice, Sierra and her two friends who she told me were Yosh and Snowy, iEcho, Kitty, Mat, Preston, Ian, and a limping Sky.

"Jordan," Sierra said. She hugged me and almost fell onto her knees but I caught her, "I so glad I found you. But you were also found by Herobrine."

"You're in serious trouble. I hope you know that the necklace you're wearing is actually Sky's and it is really powerful," I told her.

"I know."

"Huh?"

Sky continued, "Herobrine was after me when I still had the necklace. To protect the Sky Army, I gave it to someone I could trust completely. That would be Sierra."

"Sky knew that I wouldn't be found by him. Who would guess that some nobody would have possession of the Budder King's trusted necklace?" Sierra added.

"You're not a nobody," I stated. Holding her hand, I faced the rest of my friends, "We have to defeat Herobrine once and for all. I can't do it all by myself, so I need all of your help."

Kitty piped in, "What about Fury?"

I sighed, "We will rescue him first. For you." She smiled, "Do you have any idea where he could be?"

"With my arch enemy, Oblivion."

"Oblivion?!" Sky surprisingly questioned.

"How do you know her?" Mat requested an answer.

"Believe it or not, she's my cousin."

Even though I did not personally know this "Oblivion" girl, my mouth gaped open in shock.

"Sky, why didn't you tell us you had a freaking cousin?!" Preston queried.

"Cause I haven't seen you guys in months! I had beaten by those damn _squids_."

"But I haven't told you where Oblivion's hideout is…" Kitty told us.

"Where is it?" Sierra asked.

"The Aether."


	11. Chapter 11

**The song for this chapter is: Skyscraper by Demi Lovato.**

**To make room for one more OC, a major plot twist has been incorporated into the last half of this chapter.**

I remembered exactly where the portal to the Aether was. I led the group back to the stone building. We took the same hallways into the master room. The portals to the Nether and Aether were still in their exact places, not touched at all.

"Wow," iEcho conveyed. Her voice echoed throughout the giant room. As the others glanced around at the walls and the magnificence of their surroundings, I almost thought of leading them into the Nether to battle Herobrine.

"Too soon," I reminded myself, "Sky's not healed yet. I can wait."

Spinning to face the Aether portal, I heard Sierra gasp, "Who is that?"

I realized what she was talking about. Two dark figures remained in the shadows, not coming any closer.

"Kitty," an unfamiliar female voice said, "It's nice to see you again."

Kitty recognized this voice immediately. "Oblivion! Give me back Fury!" She demanded.

"Alright then…" One of the figures pushed the other into the light. Fury was lying there, uninjured but unconscious. Kitty ran over to pick up her brother. Mat joined her in lifting him up. Oblivion continued, "Wait… you can keep your brother only if… I get him." She pointed directly to me. Everyone could figure this out.

"What do you want with Jordan?!" Ian exclaimed.

Oblivion finally came into view. She had pure midnight black hair covered in black sparkles, and dark grey eyes. She wore a midnight black suit and black pants, "I made a simple deal with Herobrine. Bring him CaptainSparklez, I get a lifetime of diamonds."

"Diamonds aren't worth a human life," Sky growled while balancing on iEcho's shoulder, "Especially not one of my best friends. I've lost enough of them."

"You don't understand… I've already failed my end of the bargain with him. I didn't bring the One with the Golden Necklace…" I started.

"Budder…" Sky mumbled.

I ignored it because I was so furious at this point, "He tried to kill me about ten minutes ago when I surrendered..."

"You surrendered? What a wimp." Oblivion laughed.

"A wimp?!" Sierra begun, "Jordan is one of the bravest guys I know. He went through all this trouble just to save everyone he cared about. He made a deal with _Herobrine _to rescue Sky from the squids. He reunited friends and created love that can never go away. Ever."

"I don't care about love!" Oblivion screamed and made her way towards me, "I want those diamonds!"

In a psychopathic rage, Kitty slashed through Oblivion with a diamond sword as she walked past. The evil girl who I had just met lied on the ground within a split second. None of us could believe what had just happened. Kitty stood there, panting like she had sprinted ten miles.

"I killed you with the one thing you wanted the most. Now you can't hurt Jordan or Fury."

We all exited the building without even going inside the portal. It was the easiest rescue mission I had ever done.

Sierra POV

Once outside, all was calm. The trees swayed in the wind. Looking up, the sky contained a aqua blue color. I held onto Jordan's hand.

Yosh's eyes widened and he ran over to Sky, "You were in the prisons with the squids, right?"

"Yeah."

"Was Sly there?"

"Uh… I don't know. Sorry."

"How about Toby?" Kitty asked.

"Don't know about him either."

A strong male voice called through the trees, "Thought you could get away so easily, huh?"

"Oh no." I heard Jordan groan. Chris and his Homies were standing in front of us.

"Chris?" Yosh questioned.

"My old friend Yosh! How are you?"

"Not doing so well. You told Ember that I was the cause of Sly's kidnapping. Who does that?"

"Ha! I do."

"By the way, what happened to Ember?"

"She was killed. By the Illusionists."

Snowy gasped.

"I have to tell you again… it was Wolf's actions…" Beatrice claimed.

"No," Jordan interrupted, "I can't let this go on. I killed them. Both of them. I tried to protect iEcho from being murdered."

"Wolf too?"

He nodded. I held his hand even tighter than before.

"It's okay," I whispered in his ear. He glanced down at his feet.

Another girl talked this time, "Jordan, I lied to you about my past. My name is not really Susan. It's Mia." She snapped and her appearance changed dramatically. Instead of having brown hair and a Tardis dress, she transformed with the same brown hair but this time they had light red ends. Mia wore a thin white jacket, short shorts, and purple glasses, "To tell you the real truth, I hated Sky. He didn't do _anything_ to help out his army while they died in front of his eyes. I was a spy for the Sky Army, the Illusionists, Herobrine, and the Homies."

Chris glanced over at Mia, "Wait… you're a spy for us?" She smirked and nodded. He motioned for his group to back up away from her, "And Herobrine?!"

"If you're spying on the Homies and Herobrine, then who do you really work for?" Beatrice cautiously asked.

Blobs emerged from the darkness of the trees. They revealed themselves to be navy blue squids.

"Dammit! Those _squids_!" Sky murmured. As he attempted to run towards them, iEcho kept him on her shoulder.

Chris and his group ran over to Beatrice, "We may need to schedule a temporary truce. You're gonna need all the help you can get."

The Enderdragons joined in too. Mat led them, "Us as well."

"You already know that the Sky Army is in," iEcho mentioned.

I acknowledged her with a nod. Jordan smiled and let go of my hand. He pulled out a budder sword and raised it in the air for everyone to see, "This is for the revolution against the squids!" All of our allies except Sky and iEcho charged at the enemies.


	12. Chapter 12

**The song for this chapter is: Eyes Open by Taylor Swift.**

**Battle time!**

Beatrice's POV

I rushed at a random squid and chopped its head off. Two others approached me and I spotted Chris close by.

"Chris! Back me up!" I yelled over all the commotion. He heard me, spun around, and sliced the squid behind him. Nodding, I hurried over to his side and came back to back with him.

"You know," he whispered, "You're not so bad. Maybe we could do this more often."

"Hopefully not battling squids… but sure. Our temporary truce can be permanent. Just make sure that Susan, or should I say, Mia, doesn't come back."

"Oh, I'll make sure!" Chris angrily sliced the head off of another squid, "I didn't trust her completely anyways. A little too psycho for the Homies. She would be disapproved by Sly."

This was when I noticed Jordan's friend Sierra get caught by one of the squids. As she struggled to escape its grasp, I raced over from Chris and chopped off two of its tentacles at the same time. Although the squid was not yet dead, the action released her. Together, Sierra and I took easily took it down.

"Thank you," she told me.

"No problem. If you would just excuse me…" I started to head back to Chris.

"You're the daughter of Herobrine." I stopped in my tracks.

"How'd you hear that?"

"Your father himself. He told me he had a daughter named Beatrice."

"Why would he do that?"

"He also told me I would never see the light of day again… so that may have had an impact."

I turned to face her, "How did you get caught by him anyways?"

"It was before I got Sky's necklace. I was searching the woods for food with another Sky Army recruit. We stopped to rest and Herobrine unexpectedly showed up. It must have been territory outside of Sky's boundaries. So, he took me and the other recruit, his name was Harry, into the Nether. Harry was immediately killed but I wasn't. Herobrine said that I had potential. He tried to make a deal with me: if I stay in the Nether, then I could live."

The battle went on around us but I still wanted to hear the rest of her story, "Go on."

"The deal didn't go so well. When I had said yes, he turned away, leaving time for me to escape the Nether with no damage. I made my way to the Sky Army HQ and haven't said a word to anyone. You're the first person to hear this."

"Why me?"

"Cause you asked."

"Oh…" I returned to hack the squids to pieces. Sierra identified something so she hastened away from me. Looking back, I hoped that she didn't get caught, especially by my father, the King of the Nether.

Fury POV

I woke up to find myself next to a guy not much younger than me. With his eyes staring directly in front of him, he didn't seem to blink.

"Hello?" I asked, waving my hand in front of his face to try to get his attention, "What's going on?"

"Squids. Plenty of them."

"You look familiar. Do you I know you?"

"Probably."

"Your name? Possibly?"

"You ask a lot of questions."

I groaned, "What is your name?!"

"My Notch! I'm Sky!" He turned his now angry head at me.

"As in _the_ Sky?"

"Yeah."

"Oh. What's with the squids? And where's my sister?"

"You mean Kitty?"

"Yeah!"

"She's over there. Here's my sword. Use it _wisely_." Sky glared at me in an awkward way.

"Why can't you fight?"

"Kidnapped and abused by those things. Broke my leg." He pointed to a girl who sat next to him. She was in the middle of a sleep, "Don't wake her. Not worth it. And if a squid comes, I know what to do."

"Okay. Well, nice to meet you, Sky."

"I didn't get your name."

"Fury."

His friendly grin pleased me. I raced off into battle.

Jordan's POV** (I only put this here because there were other characters before him. No need to get confused.)**

I teamed up with Mat and Ian. We took down at least thirty squids before I started to notice that we were winning. Most of the squids were gone, but all of our recruits remained standing and alive. They had minor injuries, but were able to fight.

"For Sky!" I heard a familiar voice scream. When Mat, Ian, and I turned to the direction of the voice, we saw Ty, Ryan, Quentin, Jerome, and one of the Sky Army recruits burst in through the woods and start chopping down squids.

"Finally!" I yelled. Ryan noticed me and we reunited by helping me kill a squid.

"I'm so glad that you're okay," Ryan told me.

"You're never gonna believe what's happened."

"Oh, I think I know pretty well. You're having a battle versus the squids without me!" We smacked down a couple more of them with our diamond swords, "And you won't believe who I found! I thought he was dead!"

"Who are you talking about?"

"Jordan."

Behind me stood none other than: Mitch.

"What the Nether?! But…"

"You thought I died. The squid didn't kill me. He knocked me unconscious. When I woke up, no one was on the battlefield, so I left."

"Man. Now I don't have to regret myself for anything!"

"You shouldn't have in the first place." Mitch smirked and split open a squid advancing towards him. Mitch, Ryan, and I met back up with Ian, Mat, and Preston, who had recently joined them. Jerome sped over and tackled Mitch. They almost got run over by incoming Enderdragon recruits until I helped pull them up. Ty and Quentin were able to find us and we fought the last of the squids.

I was the one who killed the last squid. The only one on the rival team who still stood was Mia.

"There's more where that came from," she announced.

"Give it up," Beatrice told her, "What are you trying to get from all this fighting?"

"Revenge. On Sky."

Sky, sitting against a tree off to the side, perked up his ears and used a branch to stand. iEcho woke up just in time to help him.

"I don't even remember what I did," Sky said, using iEcho as balance.

"Yes. You remember. You killed my brother."

"I don't…"

"His name was Harry. He was killed one day while out hunting. There would have been no other explanation than a murder. From the report I heard, there were no creepers, skeletons, any mobs that could've done any damage. The girl who he was hunting with came back and had no explanation for why he went missing. I believe that Sky went outside and since he had a hatred for Harry, killed him. The girl was just protecting him."

Sierra gasped and covered her mouth.

"Mia, you don't understand. I wouldn't kill any of my own recruits," Sky admitted.

"But you absolutely hated my family. For years, we had been part of the Sky Army and you paid no attention to _any_ of us. One time, I started a revolution but one of your recruits…" Mia stared at Ty during this, "Had to ruin it."

"Have I had information on what was going on, I could have stopped it…"

"It's too late! He's gone! And it's your fault, Sky! You fault!" Mia spanned around and rushed through the forest. No one dared to follow her.


	13. Chapter 13

**I am posting another chapter today cause you guys loved the last one so much! So here you go!**

**The song for this chapter is: Run by Snow Patrol (Check out the SMASH version by Katharine McPhee if you can).**

After a few minutes, everyone seemed to regroup. The Illusionists, even Beatrice, returned to their camp. Ian, Mat, and Preston told the Enderdragons that they had to leave, and so the trio returned to the Sky Army. The Homies left as well. Sky, Ty, Quentin, Jerome, Mitch, Ryan, Ian, Mat, Preston, iEcho, Sierra, Yosh, Snowy, Kitty, Fury, the recruit, who's name was Annie, and I remained. Annie had blue hair with purple high lights and wore a black and blue dress.

"You have all done me proud," Sky told us, "But there is one person who made this happen. Jordan, I am personally thanking you for saving me and all of the others."

"And man, am I glad to see you doods again," Mitch remarked. He and Jerome had one of each of their arms around each other's necks.

"I think we should go back to HQ," Ian suggested. Everyone but me nodded. I stayed silent and stared at the ground. As the rest of the group prepared to leave the battlefield, Ryan noticed I was looking a little down.

"Hey, what's wrong?" he asked.

"It's not over. Herobrine isn't gone. He's after me, Sky, and Sierra."

"Herobrine?"

"It's a long story." Following the group back to HQ, I told Ryan about everything that had happened within the time I left in the first place.

"Wow," he replied when I finished, "I didn't realize it was that tough. Does everyone else know?"

"Not the whole story. Only parts."

"So you rescued Sky? Amazing."

"But I'm being tracked down by Herobrine. HQ is the first place he'll check."

Ryan stopped me in my walk, "Then we need to get you out of here."

"No… it's fine." I continued as I strolled past him. He rolled his eyes and went with the flow.

HQ was just as I remembered it. Everything practically made out of budder, signs with red lines through pictures of squids, and plenty of room for the millions of recruits it held. It was the perfect place to hold powerful army.

Sky entered and Quentin ran off to make him crutches. In the meanwhile, he motioned for everyone in the group to sit down at the conference table. Of course he was at the head. I sat to his left and Mitch across from me.

"So, as you know, I was the hostage of the squids for about two months. They beat me senselessly and I happened to escape death twice. I suppose Notch is out there somewhere. I am glad that I have finally found all of you, especially those who were thought to be dead. Maybe we can look for others from the Sky Army who fled the battlefield during the final battle."

Quentin returned with newly carved wooden crutches and laid them next to Sky's chair, "Here, I made these."

"Thanks, Mudkip," he returned to the meeting at the table, "As I was saying, we can split up into groups of four and search for more recruits. You can decide your own teams."

Ty, Quentin, and Annie automatically drew to Sky. Preston, iEcho, Mat, and Ian formed a group. Mitch and I bonded, so we recruited Ryan and Jerome. Sierra, Yosh, and Snowy teamed up as well. Kitty and Fury were left out of the mix.

"We have to leave anyways," Kitty told me. They were on their way to find Toby and the rest of the Audience members. I asked if the Sky Army could join them but she responded by saying that the matter was personal. Without hesitation, Kitty led Fury out of HQ. I haven't seen the twins since that day.

"This will probably be our last time at HQ for a long time," Sky announced, "So grab any supplies that you need."

I had already gotten myself an enchantment on my bow, making it Power III with flaming arrows. My armor was all Protection II and I still held onto Wolf's diamond Sharpness II sword. Mitch, Jerome, and Ryan had all enchanted weapons and armor as well. We crafted six enchanted budder apples just in case we ran out of food.

Just as we were about to leave, Sierra came over to me, "Goodbye for now, Jordan. I spent the last week trying to look for you. And now I have to leave again? I can't…"

"Sierra, I'm in love with you."

She paused her thoughts, "Huh?"

"From the moment I saw you under that tree, I couldn't forget the way you made me feel. When you left, I thought of turning back and going after you."

"You didn't want to hurt me."

I nodded, "To protect you, actually. Now that we're going our separate ways…"

"I'll miss you too." She finished my sentence. I came closer to her and put my hands around her waist. She romantically glanced up into my eyes but the only thing we did was hug. The only problem on our minds was not seeing each other, maybe never again.

Beatrice POV

I returned to Illusionists HQ. There was still that giant crater created by the Homies' explosive. All of my recruits stepped around it and entered their residences. I, on the other hand, made my way to the conference room.

"I'm the new leader," I thought to myself, "What am I supposed to do? I've had no previous training… or even talked to Wolf about becoming a leader."

"You need any help?" This voice sounded familiar but I couldn't distinguish it from the others in my camp. I heard it as if it were myself, as a male.

"No…" I decided not to turn around to face this man.

"Whether you like it or not, you need me. It's just your way of life. You always need someone that you can trust to get through to Herobrine."

I didn't respond and tried to glance over my shoulder to see whose body the voice belonged to.

"You know, Beatrice, I missed you. Life in the Nether was hard, having to work for father, and all that."

"Do I know you?" Confused, I wondered why he would mention my father… unless...

"Of course. I'm your brother."

"Ray?!"


	14. Chapter 14

**The song for this chapter is: What Hurts the Most by Rascal Flatts.**

Ryan and I lagged behind while Mitch and Jerome took the lead. We were heading over near where the Enderdragon camp used to be. Mat told me that their followers had abandoned that campsite for a new one closer to the other groups. But no one knew… of who we would find.

"I won the freaking HUNGER GAMES!" Jerome screamed at the most random time. I chuckled and Ryan glared at me. I backed off for only a moment and glared at him.

"Dude, what are you doing." I could tell Ryan was saying that through his facial expressions, "Jerome did _not_ win the hunger games. There hasn't even been a hunger games for almost a year."

"He doesn't care," I whispered so only Ryan could hear. He rolled his eyes but grinned at the thought of me reading his mind.

We finally reached the deserted Enderdragon camp. All of its vines were still hanging onto the stone buildings. Although the cobble roads were burned from the Illusionist incident, the structures remained intact. I could make out Mat, Ian, and Preston's kingly mansion in the midst of everything. As much as I wanted to enter, I couldn't leave the group. I hadn't seen my friends in ages and I wasn't about to lose them again.

A shadow passed through the corner of my eye. With no idea what it was, I decided to ignore it. Unlike me, Mitch began to worry.

"Jordan? Ryan? Jerome?" I heard Mitch quietly ask, "Who is that?"

The shadow became more of a figure. The figure became more familiar. And there was only one person that came into my head while I glanced at the shadowy figure sneaking through the town: Ant.

Yosh POV **(Thanks to yoshiboshi123 for the idea!)**

Snowy, Sierra, and I had started to travel to a place that Snowy called "The Great Tree." Why were we going _there_?

Somehow I was leading the girls by a few feet and came to a crossroads. I went right. Why did I go right?! It was left! Well, they came to the same crossroads and went down the left path. I was alone and lost with no food or shelter. With none of the equipment except my bag of medical supplies, my sword, and my armor, I trudged through the mud looking for my teammates.

Eventually, I came across a campfire next to two large-sized satin tents. No one was around and chicken cooked over the fire. Quickly, I stuffed the grilled chicken into my bag.

"What are you doing here?" I heard an familiar voice ask, "And the chicken?"

I spun around to face none other than Chris, "Hey… there."

"You came back?! You're dead!" Chris rallied up five more of the Homies and ran after me. As I ran, I searched the woods for my friends but they were not found. Suddenly I encountered the crossroads another time. I took the left path. Hiding behind a tree, I noticed Chris and his group chose the right.

"Bad mistake. Bad mistake," I thought to myself, grinning. Moving away from the tree, I continued on the path. I ate the chicken, which tasted good after the idea of victory against my enemies. They weren't defeated yet but once I had superior forces, the Homies' army could easily be destroyed.

Suddenly, I came across a building. Made of out diamond, obsidian, and gold, **(Since he's not part of the Sky Army, Yosh does not say budder) **this building rose ten feet in beautiful glorification. I could not stay away. I advanced towards the building but saw signs posted in the nicely trimmed grass. They said: "Visitors welcome." "For all of your hospitality needs." and "The HQ of IHasCupquake."

I did not recognize this name but since it seemed friendly, I entered the front door, crafted out of obsidian blocks. There was a small table with a smiling lady standing behind it. She wore a black suit jacket over a thin, white collared shirt with a black pencil skirt and black high heels.

"Hello," she said, "How can I help you?"

"Uh… I'm looking for former recruits from the Sky Army or… even refuge. By any chance…?"

"Of course," the lady answered. She handed me a chain with two keys on it.

"What are these for?"

"Your room. Cupquake is always happy to have new refugees, especially when they're from the Sky Army."

"But I'm not…" I tried to tell her that I was with Sly, but the lady pushed me into a long and narrow hallway.

"Room 123, please."

I faced her to argue, but I was awfully tired. Using one the keys that the lady gave me, I opened Room 123. It was not very spacious, but cozy. There was one soft bed, a clean and wooden work table, a crafting table, an enchantment table, and a chest filled with food and basic supplies.

"Livable," I told myself, "And good-looking too. This whole place is good-looking." Exhausted, I placed my supplies on the work table and laid on the bed. After two minutes, I was fast asleep.

Sierra POV

"Snowy, have you found him yet?!" I yelled to Snowy across a river. We were heading to "The Great Tree" when we lost Yosh. He had gone off on his own, and worried, we started to search for him.

"Yosh?" Snowy called out, "Yosh?!" She swam back across the river and met back up with me.

"Let's head towards the tree. Maybe we're just imagining this and he's already there."

"No! I _have_ to find him! He's my only friend!"

"Aren't I…" I tried to get out. But I knew that Yosh meant more to Snowy than anything else. I didn't want to ruin my friendship with the duo, so I stayed away from her search.

She led me through more trees and found a campsite with a fire and two large-sized satin tents. No one was around so we continued on the path. As soon as we heard noises coming from behind us, I pushed Snowy against a tree and shielded her. I turned towards the campsite and saw Chris and five others.

"We lost him…" Chris groaned, "Wonder where he went…" He glanced around his surroundings and I caught him stare at something on the distant ground. I followed his eyes and focused on where he was looking. It was Snowy's shoe.

"Damn it," I whispered and pulled her towards me.

"What are you doing?" she whispered back.

"Chris."

He had heard something in the direction we were and called out, "Is anyone there?"

Snowy accidentally stepped on leaves, revealing our location to three of the Homies. They brought us back to Chris.

"Look who we have. Yosh's friends. The one I was about to slice the head of, and the other one…"

"My name is Snowy, by the way."

He glanced over at Snowy, "Just wondering, what group do you belong to?"

I thought she was going to say Illusionists but she replied, "Sky Army."

Chris turned his attention to me, "And you?"

"Same." I tried not to look at him by glaring down at the dirt.

"Bring them to HQ. We've got some information to collect." Chris led his Homies, who were holding me and Snowy, to their headquarters.


	15. Chapter 15

**The song for this chapter is: Stupid in Love by Rihanna.**

I had always known Ant as the master of Hunger Games. All of the time he sneaked around, looking for victims to pounce on. He was one of the only players that could defeat me. We were enemies during gameplay, but best friends when it came to other things.

When I saw him in the former Enderdragon camp, it was a relief. I thought he was dead. It seemed to be the same incident as Mitch.

"Ant?" I carefully crept up closer to the dimmed figure.

"Jordan? Is that you?" a voice asked. This was Ant.

"Yeah."

"Oh my Notch! I've finally found you! Literally been looking for what… two months?! And Mitch! Jerome! Ryan! Nice to see you! I missed you guys!" He came closer to reveal himself. Ant wore all black and his usually straight and flat black hair was abnormally curly.

"You and Jason got killed. How is it possible?" Mitch told Ant.

"We didn't. You may have seen duplicates."

"Huh?"

"See, no one truly died. The ones who were supposedly killed were actually caught by the squids and replaced by mannequins. There were others who were truly _thought_ dead, like Mitch."

"You got caught by the squids?" Ryan asked.

"Yeah. There were these cells. I got put with Jason, Kermit, Noah, Seto, Dawn, and a lot of others who I didn't recognize. Everyone else was scattered throughout the rest of the prisons."

"What happened? How'd you get out?"

"The squids figured out that there was someone who escaped, so they tried to relocate us…"

I remembered iEcho's story, "I know. I know who escaped."

"How?"

"She is with Mat, Ian, and Preston. Her name is iEcho and she was the one who escaped from that cell. She left without knowing what happened to her cellmates, thinking that all of you were going to get killed."

"No… they didn't want to kill us yet. They wanted to use us as bait for if they needed information from Sky. In an attempt to transfer us, the squids failed miserably, letting us leave the squid dimension and reenter our own dimension. I rushed by myself, leaving Jason and the others. I wonder if they ever made it out."

"Well, let's hope so. We've actually on the hunt for other recruits, so I'm glad we found you."

"Good thing."

"Let's look for more people, and maybe I can win the HUNGER GAMES!" Jerome screamed out yet again.

"Dood," Mitch motioned for Jerome to lower his voice level, "Not so loud."

"Okay. Sorry, Benj."

Beatrice POV

I spun around to see the 25 year old man with tan skin, blue hair, green eyes under dim sunglasses, and a gray outfit. I could barely make out the scar going down his right eye.

"Ray?! What… what… how?"

"He finally let me go. As long as I brought you back."

"But… You always come with a but."

"But… I'm not going back. I don't listen to anyone's orders anymore."

"I should find my friends again. They have to know about this."

"I've gotta mention this… he also wants the boy by the name of CaptainSparklez."

"Obviously." I stashed a diamond sword in my sword-buckle and led Ray outside, "CaptainSparklez, or Jordan, is one of my friends. If he doesn't know that Herobrine is back and after him, then he's screwed."

"I think he wants to use you as bait."

"Why?"

"Since you're such good friends with him, you can lead his group to the Nether."

"That would be a position for those such as Sierra or Sky. Not me."

"Don't you miss mother?"

"Yeah. Please don't talk about it."

"Sometime we have to."

"Okay," I annoyingly shot a glare at him, "Go on."

"There are some things that I didn't tell you about… about mother."

"Such as…?"

"She was murdered."

"What? You told me that she suffered from cancer."

"No. She was killed… by father."

"I can't believe it."

"You should. He hated her. This led to us working like slaves just to get a crumb of bread. Herobrine had no reason to marry but he wanted to produce children to do the dirty work for him."

"He was a jerk."

"Don't say that out loud. He's _always_ watching you."

Responding to his comment with a different concept, I asked, "What about Void?"

He seemed confused. "What about her?"

"Where is she?"

"With him," he sighed.

"Oh." I paused for a moment, "And Ty?"

"Ty… our brother Ty?"

"Yeah."

"Isn't he with the Sky Army?"

My mouth gaped open. This was the same Ty that ran into battle with the rest of the Sky Army recruits. I had not recognized him because I hadn't seen him in years, "Yes. He is."

"Oh, yeah, that's right. Herobrine wants all of his four children. He only let me have a freebie because I made a deal with him. Is that gonna work out though? No damn way."

"So me, you, Ty, and Void?"

Ray nodded.

"I'm not going back to that place. If you want to join me, I'll be on my way to the Sky Army HQ."

"No worries. I'm coming." He grinned and took off his sunglasses. His scar was more visible.

"I remember when he did that to you," I mentioned, "You asked for a day of freedom. He scratched you with his own hand. Didn't even let the zombie pig men touch you."

"I know." Ray glanced down at his feet for a split second but then lifted up his head, "I'll lead you to the HQ. After being a spy for twenty-five years, I know my way around this area."

"Alright." He led me into the massive trees, glooming down upon us. The sky became grayer and mistier as we advanced more into the woods. I realized that I had just left the Illusionists with no leader. No one to lead them in case of attack. I hoped that someone would eventually take over, most likely my successor.

No matter what I said, fought, or defended, Herobrine was there. _He was always there_.


	16. Chapter 16

**The song for this chapter is: Stay by Rihanna.**

Sky POV

Although I held tight onto the arms of my crutches, Quentin tried his very best to help me. Ty, leading our group, was paying no attention, Annie at his side. We wandered aimlessly in the forest, looking out for anything we could find.

"What's up with Ty? Is there anything I missed while I was gone?" I quietly asked Quentin.

"There was the fact that everyone thought you were dead. Ty got hurt the most."

"You guys should've been able to deal with it on your own."

"How? Our leader missing, no one left to deal with the squids, and only seven people in the whole army."

"So it was you, Ty, Jerome, Ryan, Sierra, Annie, and Mia?"

"And two days of Jordan."

"Yeah. Anything else?"

"Well, there was that one day…" I glared at him strangely. Quentin continued, "We were all in the main storage room. Mia, or at that point, Susan, stood up on one of the boxes. She started yelling about how you deserted us and that we should abandon the Sky Army. It stung us… a lot. Furious and upset, Ty kicked her out."

"Is that one of the reasons for that squid invasion yesterday?"

"Probably."

"Nothing more than that?"

"Nuh uh." Quentin shook his head. It was silent for another minute as we tried to catch up to Ty and Annie.

"Quentin! Annie! I found it!" Ty shouted. He didn't say my name. It kind of offended me. Focusing on what Ty found, I noticed him race up to a large building made out of diamond, obsidian, and budder. There were signs on the grass that read stuff that I couldn't make out from my location. I only saw one: "The HQ of IHasCupquake."

Yosh POV

I finally woke up, still on the comfortable bed in that small but cozy room. There was a knock on the door. Yawning, I stood up and carefully opened it to find the lady with the black heels who gave me the keys.

"Good morning, sir," she said.

"You can call me Yosh," I told her, "No need to get all fancy like."

"Alright, Yosh. Breakfast is ready. We have some more guests from the Sky Army joining us today."

"Huh?" She gave me fresh clothes and I changed into them. It was a plain white T-shirt, blue pants, and clean white socks. With only socks on my feet, I followed the woman, who's name was Isabel, into the dining hall. A girl with brown hair, a gray tank top with a cupcake on it, black shorts, rainbow colored socks, black shoes, red bracelets on her wrists, and a pink flower in her hair, sat at the head of the table. To my surprise, Sky, Quentin, Ty, and Annie sat at the long wooden table as well. There were others who I did not recognize.

"Good morning, visitor," the girl called me out.

"You can call me Yosh…"

"Shouldn't you be with your group?" Sky asked. He glanced at me, slightly lifting his sunglasses from his eyes to look at me.

"Uh… I got lost." Nervous, I sat down in the chair next to the girl. Sky sat across from me.

"Hi," the girl said, "My name is IHasCupquake, but you can call me Cupquake for short."

"Okay," I told her, "Thank you for letting me stay."

"It's my pleasure. This is a friendly place where everyone is safe. No one would dare to come and attack."

"May I ask… why?"

Cupquake was silent and glanced down at her food-filled plate before continuing, "I would rather keep that between me and the rest of my group." She took a glimpse of me and smiled, "Well, enjoy the meal."

The Sky Army recruits, and Cupquake and her group, including Isabel, ate most of the food on their plate. I barely touched anything. Cupquake tapped me on the shoulder.

"Are you going to eat that?" she asked.

"No. You can have it if you want."

"It's alright. I'm stuffed already. Isabel!"

Isabel perked up from her breakfast, "Yes?"

"Can you take Yosh's plate into the kitchen?"

"Yes…"

"It's fine," I told her, "I can bring it in." As I stood up, Cupquake sat me down again.

"Let her."

I decided to let it be, although I did not understand Cupquake's motives. There was something hidden in her HQ that she wanted no one else to know about.

iEcho POV

"Hey Mat," Ian asked, "Where are we going?"

"Uh…" Mat replied, "To the…"

"You cactus! You don't know where we're going, do you?" Preston demanded.

"Preston, come on, let him be," I defended Mat.

"Alright. But only for you."

I blushed. Running up to meet with Mat, I personally questioned him, "Do you know where we're going?"

"No idea," he responded, "Have any thoughts?" I shook my head and glanced around.

"So," Ian investigated, "What now?"

"I don't know," Preston replied, "Ask Mat. He seems to know what he's doing." Mat rolled his eyes and persisted on being silent. I glared back at Preston and motioned slicing off his neck.

"Mat, where are we going?"

"Please, Ian. Don't."

"Okay, okay, chill out!"

There were many trees surrounding us. The sky became gray. Clouds covered a large portion of the gray. The whole location made me feel nautilus and light-headed. In the midst of this, my eye caught something a little too familiar. And referring to familiar, in a _bad_ way.

"Oh my Notch!" I shouted and then covered my mouth with my hands. Nervous, I spun around to make sure no one else but Mat, Ian, and Preston heard.

Preston ran up me and held onto my arm. Worried, he looked down into my eyes, "What's wrong? Are you okay?"

I struggled to get out my words as I viewed the_ thing_, "The… the… portal. To the squid dimension."

In front of us was the navy blue wool and obsidian-made portal leading to the dimension of the squids.

**The squid portal has been found! What happens next? You'll just have to wait for tomorrow's chapter!**


	17. Chapter 17

**The song for this chapter is: Runaway Baby by Bruno Mars.**

**Sorry this one's a bit short. Writer's block kills. Literally.**

I heard a faint scream coming from my right ear.

"Did you hear that?" I asked the others.

"No," Ant replied, "What was it?"

"A scream."

"From who?" Jerome questioned.

"It was a girl. But I don't know who exactly. Couldn't distinguish the voice."

"Do you think we should follow it?" Mitch queried. Ryan and Ant shrugged.

"Yeah let's do this!" Jerome yelled. I was sure that someone a mile away could hear his scream.

"Calm down Jerome," I told him.

I led Ant, Jerome, Mitch, and Ryan towards where I had heard the scream. We eventually came to an abandoned campsite. There were two large-sized satin tents and a burnt-out fire. It seemed as if no one had been there in a few hours.

"Jordan," Mitch said, "Check this out." He had found footprints leading away from the campsite.

"What do we do?" Ant asked.

"Follow them," I affirmed. Determined to find the voice, I directed my group away from the tents back into the woods.

Eventually the footprints stopped in front of a small brick building. We regarded this area as a wasteland. There was absolutely nothing else around but the building. Gulping, I opened the door and walked inside. To our surprise, Chris and five of his Homies had Sierra and Snowy bound to chairs, threatening them at knifepoint.

"What do you think you're doing!" I demanded. Chris spun around to notice me, Ant, Ryan, Mitch and Jerome. His gang outnumbered us, but we had the better skills.

He quickly untied Sierra and Snowy, holding onto Sierra and letting one of the others hold Snowy. He smirked, "Come and get the girls… if you can catch us."

"Piece of cake," Ryan whispered. I raced up to the Homies, my Sky Army crew following behind at full pace. Chris took off, Sierra in his grasp.

A minute later, Ant, being his speedy self, grabbed Chris's arm and pulled him back, "If you dare hurt my friends again… I swear… I'll see you killed." Chris winced back and pushed Sierra towards our group. She ran into my arms.

"Are you alright?" I whispered to her. She nodded and continued hugging me, "Where's Yosh?"

"I have no idea," she replied.

"Leave us alone," Ant continued, "And we'll leave you alone. Got it." He was practically strangling Chris.

"Ant," Mitch interrupted, "That's enough." Letting go of Chris's throat, Ant advanced to leave the brick building. The rest of us followed him, leaving the Homies behind.

Void POV **(Yes, Void is back. Thanks to Sallyya Charbon for most of this POV.)**

I sat out of Herobrine's sight as he slaughtered half his zombie pig men army. I shivered at the thought that if he turned around he may change his target to me.

"Idiot human," I whispered to myself as another squeal reached my ears, "Don't they ever learn."

I rested my chin on my knee's staring at a nearby red stone torch. I knew Herobrine temper would stop soon, but what would he do. Would he want that human along with ones he lost? I nodded to myself. Yes, it was clear, however, who would he use to try and get them back? Beatrice, the traitor? Ray, the long lost brother? Ty, Sky's ally?

"You!" roared Herobrine. Leaving my train of thought behind, I quickly stood up and walked into his line of sight. He was smiling, but his blank eyes prevent me from seeing his true emotion.

"Yes, Lord Herobrine," I replied with a small bow. I daren't take my eyes of him.

"Get Sky, your siblings, the girl and that captain what's his name, back," he ordered.

"Of course my lord," I accepted, "But how?"

Herobrine shook his head, "Lie, make some story or have you been _honest_ all your life."

I bit my lip to force back my sarcastic laughter but bowed again. As if I've ever been honest. I had been a spy for him for years. I spun around and was about to run out of the castle…

"Fail me and I'll punish you the same way I punished your mother," Herobrine warned. I hesitantly nodded and set off to make my way to the over-world.

I stood staring at the portal; I could feel Herobrine's emotionless eyes watching me. Yes, I had a plan. A brilliant one if it is completed, in fact. I stepped through the portal. Let see if it works.


	18. Chapter 18

**The song for this chapter is: Titanium by David Guetta (feat. Sia).**

Sky POV

"Sky?" Quentin asked me, "Why are we leaving so soon?"

"We have to get Yosh back to his group. Sierra and Snowy are probably desperate right now," I replied.

"But Cupquake was so nice…"

"Listen."

"But Sky…"

"Please," I turned my attention to Yosh, "Where was the last time you saw the girls?"

"It was at this path. There were crossroads and…" Yosh answered. He glanced down in thought.

"And?"

"I took the right path. It was left. Freaking left."

"So, where do you think they are?"

Yosh spun and faced me, creating an angry expression, "Why are you asking me?! I just told you that I don't know!" He glared behind me, "Who are you?"

"Huh?"

"I'm here for Ty." A female voice said. I turned towards the voice and noticed a familiar girl, "Do I know you?"

"No," she responded, "I need Ty." Ty perked up and looked at the girl.

"Um, I would have recognized you if I knew you. Why do you_ need_ me?" Ty questioned.

"Personal matters. We have to find two others and then complete our mission."

"Can I get your name?"

"Void. I'm not lying." She grinned and continued staring at Ty, glancing over at me every once in a while, "There's a secret that you should have known about years ago. Maybe you do… and I'm just a sucker."

Ty looked at me, Quentin, Yosh, and Annie, "I going with her."

"Why?!" I burst out, "You don't even know her!"

"I do."

"Really?"

He glanced away from us and focused his attention on Void. "I know. I'm not doing anything for him though."

"Him? What are you talking about?" I angrily turned to Void, "What kind of brainwashing method have you placed on my best friend?!"

"It's not brainwashing," Void grinned, "Come on Ty, our siblings are waiting."

"What?!" I confusedly watched them enter the woods yet again.

Beatrice POV

Ray and I had spent hours searching for Jordan and hadn't had any luck.

"Have any water?" I asked him.

"Nope. We're gonna have to find a lake or something," he replied.

"Okay." I panted and grabbed for a piece of watermelon out of my backpack. This was going to have to do for liquid in the meanwhile.

"Good thing we got away from those… what do you call them… Homies?" I heard a unfamiliar voice in the distance.

"Who's there?" I called out. I raised my sword to confront the enemy.

"Jordan, maybe that voice you heard earlier did work!" the voice joked.

"Ha ha. Not funny Ant," Jordan finally said.

"Jordan!" I yelled.

"Beatrice?"

"Yeah. Through the trees!" I rushed towards his voice and found a group of seven people including Sierra, Jordan, and some of the Sky Army recruits. One of them I did not recognize.

"I found you guys," I panted, "By the way, do you have water?" Jordan automatically pulled out a bottle and handed it to me to drink. He seemed worried and glanced up at Ray.

"Who is he?" he whispered in my ear.

"Oh, he's my brother."

"Wait… you have a brother?"

"Two actually. And one sister."

"So there's four children of you-know-who?"

"You can say his name out loud. It's not like it's cursed." I rolled my eyes.

"Fine. _Herobrine_. Are there four children of Herobrine?"

"Yes. And we need to find the fourth one before my sister finds him first."

"And who's your sister?"

"Void."

"Uh… and your brother?"

I paused before revealing it to him, and only him, "Ty."

iEcho POV

"Should we go in?" I asked the boys: Preston, Mat, and Ian.

"No way," Preston announced, "I don't want you out of all people to get hurt. We can come back with Sky and the others when…"

"I want to go in." Preston stared down at me.

"No. Echo, you gotta stay away from those squids. They're murderers."

"No one calls me Echo except…" I paused, "You're Sierra's brother. The one who saved me from the squids. That one battle. She knows that I like you."

"I honestly don't mind. My younger sister isn't the biggest worry right now."

"You have a sister?" Ian questioned.

"Shut up Ian!" Preston's usual cheery mood faded away as I heightened my interest to go back into the squid dimension.

"I have some unfinished business that I have to take care of," I told them.

"Like what?" Mat queried.

"I was in the same cell as Ant and Jason during the aftermath of the final battle. I want to know if they survived."

"No," Preston interrupted, "Not worth it. We're leaving." He stormed off, Ian after him. Mat shrugged and followed his buddies. Furious, I fixed my bow strap and the iron axe I held in my hand, and crept into the portal.

Once I entered, the first thing I noticed was… squids. Plenty of them. They formed group and squads patrolling the whole entire camp. I secretly made my way to the prisons. Fortunately, I was not caught.

"Who are you?" I listened for a grumbly faint voice coming near one of the cells. I peeked inside to see a young man starting to mentally crumble in the corner of the room.

"My name is iEcho…" I whispered.

"iEcho?" He grumbled and came closer into the light to reveal himself as Toby Turner, "Sounds familiar. Can you get me out of here?"

I perked up, "Yes, yes!" I scrambled around the quarters for a key to the lock on his cell. I took the set hanging from the wall and unlocked his cell. Toby stood up and squeezed together his jaw.

"Are there any others?" I asked him.

"Yeah. Jason is here…"

"As in Minecraft Universe Jason?"

"Yep."

"Where is he?"

We sneaked along the hallways and came upon those that were not empty. Jason and another man slouched against the wall. Jason awake, took a look at Toby and leaped up. He woke the other man. I pulled out another key and unlocked their cell.

"iEcho," Jason conveyed. He weakly hung onto me. The other man stood up with no problems and causally walked out of the cell.

"Who is he?" I asked Toby.

"Him?" Toby pointed to the man.

"Yeah."

"Sly. He was the leader of the Homies until he got kidnapped by the squids, like the rest of us."

"How about the others? Where are they?"

"Others? I don't know if there are others. They're either free or dead. None are in the cells."

Determined to leave alive, I carried Jason and led Toby and Sly back to the exit of the portal.

"Leaving so soon?" A girl's voice carried out. I recognized this voice from that battle. We turned to figure out that the voice belonged to Mia, "I'm glad you could make it, iEcho. The fun is just beginning." The last thing I saw before I blacked out was Mia's devilish grin and the army of squids behind her.

**Oh noes! The squids have kidnapped iEcho! Will the others figure this out before it's too late?! Find out in the next chapters. Remember... Chapter 20 is approaching.**


	19. Chapter 19

**The song for this chapter is: Outcast by Kerrie Roberts.**

Cupcuake POV

Why did they have to leave? I was so close to getting my hands on the Budder King… my boss wouldn't like that so much. I should've caught them when I had the chance. But I knew the person responsible for their exit: Isabel. She had told them my secrets, not all, but some. Yosh had believed her and told the others that they were leaving. I could only sit there, staring at them. Unless they came back… wait… I could have recruited my friend… but she has business of her own.

I sat at my desk in my office, glancing outside the side window for any visitors. One of my recruits came up to my desk and placed a letter on the table, "Here you go, Miss Cupquake."

"Thank you Harry." I grinned, knowing that my frenemy had her eyes out for him. I was not a big fan of her plans, but I knew that she was out to destroy Sky and his army. That I could stand. Besides, knowing an evil mastermind such as Herobrine helps out a girl. Right?

"What do you want me to do now?" Harry obediently asked.

"Open the letter and read it to me, please."

Without hesitation, Harry cut the envelope and pulled out a sheet of paper.

"Cupquake, I know you work with the squids…" I perked up from slouching in my chair. He continued, "And that CaptainSparklez is a powerful weapon that the squids desperately need. I want you to stop brainwashing your victims and let Mia's brother leave your quote-a-quote prison. Leave Sky and all of his friends alone, for your own sake. There is no way that I will stop until I see you let go of your past. Just move on, Tiffany. As always, keep me in mind."

"Continue!" I announced.

"That's it. There's nothing else on the paper."

"What?!" I leaped up from my chair and ripped the letter from his hands. I read it over at least three times before realizing that Harry was correct. There was no name, "Who could've sent this to me…?"

Void POV

"Come along Ty," I whispered. I led Ty away from the Sky Army and closer to where I thought my other siblings were.

"Why do you want me? I thought I told him I would never help!"

"I remember you saying that. But he told me so. I always take orders. It's my job." Ty rolled his eyes.

We suddenly heard voices in the distance, "So as I was telling you, Herobrine forced me and Ray to do perilous jobs and… Did you hear that?" I spun around to notice Ty crumbling a dead leaf in his hands. He grinned.

"You son of a b****."

"I am the son of a b****, if you think about it. Herobrine is one." I growled and forced him to the ground, "Get off! Get off me you f****** creep!"

While about to strangle Ty, I noticed shoes on the ground next to my face. I forcefully lifted him up and pushed him against a tree. I finally recognized who I was standing next to: Jordan, Beatrice and Ray.

"I'm glad to see you two again," I bowed.

"Don't bow in front of me," Ray snarled.

"Well, you're a grumpy boy."

"I don't' take any freaking orders from that… thing!"

"You're calling your father a thing?"

"What are you talking about?" Jordan asked.

"I'll tell you, pretty boy. I'm taking my brothers and sister here to reunite with their parents. Our father misses us dearly."

"Cut it out!" Ray yelled.

"But maybe, Jordan, I can take you with me…" As I said this, I noticed Sierra, Snowy, and a few of the Sky Army recruits come out of the shadows in one big group. Out of the corner of my eye another group appeared. I turned my attention to the incoming group. The others did as well.

Jordan POV** (Again, don't want you to get confused.)**

"Why are you here?" Void asked the group, led by an unfamiliar girl.

"Cupquake?" Ty questioned.

"Yes, I'm here to get revenge. I now realize that you sent me this note Void." Cupquake held up a piece of paper. Void stared at her as I attempted to lead Sierra, Snowy, Mitch, Jerome, Ant, Ryan, and Ty away from the scene. She stopped us, "Don't you think you can get away!" Cupquake grabbed me by my shirt and pulled me towards . She started whispering in my ear, "You and iEcho are the secret weapons. You saw Sky close to killing one of our prized squids. You two and him must die."

"You don't have iEcho or Sky!" I confronted her.

"Oh really?" Cupquake smirked, "At least I have the girl."

"How'd she…?"

"iEcho was trying to save her friends. Jason is there, and Toby, and Sly."

"Sly…" I heard Snowy whisper in the background.

"So don't try to get away. Mia has some unfinished business." In a split second, Cupquake teleported the two of us into the squid dimension.

The first thing I noticed was iEcho chained to a wall. Her arm and leg were bleeding. Jason, with a bloody nose, sat next to her.

"Why?" I lowered my head in shame.

"It's not your fault Jordan," iEcho told me, "I ran off. Preston was trying to keep me safe… I know who he is by the way. He's Sierra's…" She was slapped in the face by a squid. Her face turned red from the tentacle.

"Let her go!" I screamed, "You can keep me, but at least let them leave!"

"No way," Cupquake grinned as she pulled me over to where Mia sat in a large obsidian made chair, and knocked me on my knees. I groaned as I was pushed down.

"Hello again Jordan," Mia said.

"Let them go," I whimpered, trying to stay strong, "Please."

"Cupquake, get the children of Herobrine. They'll lead him here… and then we can sacrifice this one and the girl." Mia softly scratched my chin. I wanted to swing at her but a squid held back my arms. Cupquake ran off. All I did was stare at the ground, feeling purely defenseless.

"Why iEcho?" I asked her.

"What?"

"Why iEcho?"

"She has powers that you don't even know about. You may think that your girlfriend Sierra has all the power, but that's because she has Sky's gold necklace."

"Budder," I jokingly mumbled. Mia didn't seem to be enthused.

"As I was saying, you have special powers as well. Many of your friends have powers and you don't know anything about it. The thing is… yours is the strongest. iEcho's would be the second."

"And you want to sacrifice us to Herobrine?"

"Yes. That is my plan."

"Someone will stop you. If it isn't me or iEcho, then it'll be the rest of the Sky Army. They'll realize I'm gone and then…"

"I wouldn't count on Sky to come. He's busy with Herobrine already. He's probably gotten his grasp on Sky and your girlfriend already."

"Liar!" I screamed, "You're pure evil!"

"I'm most likely worse than Herobrine himself, don't you think?" I didn't say anything back. She chuckled and motioned for the squids to chain me up. They sat me next to iEcho, as Mia walked away, and put the chains on my wrists. The squids left the prison cell and locked the door shut.

"Remember it's not your fault," iEcho reminded me, "As I was telling you… Sierra is Preston's sister."

"Really?"

"Yeah. He saved me from the squids one time during a battle and I didn't recognize him until the last time I saw him. He probably knows about my powers."

"Can someone explain this whole power thing to me? Cause I'm lost."

"This is gonna sound really, _really_ weird but we're related."

"What?"

"And we're the last surviving children of… Notch." I stared at her with my eyes wide open.

**Wait… Jordan is the child of Notch?! This is crazy! Not as crazy as Chapter 20! See for yourselves!**


	20. Update Info

I'm still in the process of writing Chapter 20, so I'm posting this just in case I cannot update the story later today.

Do not worry! It will be worth the wait!

-Ray


	21. Chapter 20

**The song for this chapter is: Sick of You by Selena Gomez.**

**This is the chapter you've all been waiting for. Here it is.**

Sky POV

"Where's Jordan?!" I questioned, confused.

All of the groups had finally combined: me, Quentin, Ty, Jerome, Mitch, Preston, Ryan, Snowy, Yosh, Sierra, Annie, Mat, Ian, Beatrice, Beatrice's bother Ray, long-lost Ant, and Void. Ty had told me about his relationship to Herobrine, along with his siblings.

"This is it!" Void announced, "I'm not going back to him. You guys have taught me a valuable lesson: never listen to evil. I somewhat learned that from Cupquake."

"Cupquake?" Yosh asked, "She was…"

"Working with the squids." We all gasped, especially me and Yosh.

"What did she do to Jordan?" I queried.

"And iEcho?" Preston added.

"She took them to the dimension of the squids. Mia is planning on sacrificing them to Herobrine for her own pleasure."

"And how do you know this?" Ty requested.

"I just do. Please believe me. I actually haven't told a lie all of today, which is really good," Void begged.

"Okay," I replied, "We're going to the squid dimension. To save Jordan and iEcho."

"And budder!" Jerome called out. Mitch punched him, "Ow. Sorry."

"No," I told him, "It's good. For budder!" Everyone cheered me on as I held up my legendary budder sword.

Jordan POV

For hours, I stayed chained next to iEcho, Toby, Jason, and Sly on that wall. They had all told me their stories. Toby and Sly had been caught because they were leaders of their own groups, and Jason was caught trying to get out during a prison break. iEcho was the cause of that break. She explained our family's backstory to me, since I didn't seem to know anything beforehand. We had at least seven other siblings, but they all ends up vanishing from the face of the planet and were heard of again. As far as she knows, we are the last ones alive.

One moment, I heard soft footsteps coming from the end of the prison hallway. I called out, "Who's there?"

"Jordan?" Sky's voice faintly whispered.

"Yeah. I'm here. Get me out!"

Sky, no longer with his crutches, easily maneuvered throughout the prison. He had Ty as backup and told me that the others were looking in other places. They unlocked the cell and released the five victims. Ty took Jason, Toby, and Sly outside of the squid dimension because they were severely injured. Sky led me and iEcho to the other Sky Army recruits.

We eventually met up with Sierra, Snowy, and Yosh. Once she noticed me, Sierra gave me a giant hug.

"You're alive," she whispered, "I didn't think you would…"

"I would never leave you without at least a goodbye. But this time I won't need a goodbye," I told her, "Cause we're not going down without a fight."

"Damn right we're not!" Sky said. Mitch and Jerome caught up with us, their iron swords covered in squid blood.

"Sky." Mitch looked absolutely stunned, "We've got a problem."

"What kind of problem?"

"Squids are fighting back. They want Jordan."

"Then I'll fight for my freedom," I announced. They glared at me in shock.

Sky nodded and led me, Mitch, Jerome, and Yosh into the battlefield.

"I want to come," Snowy yelped. She pulled out a bow and arrows and raced to meet us. Sierra decided to stay out and rushed to help Ty with Toby, Jason and Sly.

As soon as we reached the battlefield we saw hundreds of squids and only me, Sky, Quentin, Ty, Jerome, Mitch, Preston, Ryan, Snowy, Yosh, Annie, Mat, Ian, Beatrice, Ray, Ant, and Void were fighting. I slashed into several squids until I heard screams coming from the front of the portal. The Homies, Enderdragons, and Illusionists had teamed up once again and made their way to the squid dimension.

Chris hurried to my side, "I know I'm a douche. You can tell me that later. But for right now, we have some squids to kill." I sliced into a squid about to kill him and grinned. He ran off and joined Beatrice and Ray.

A few minutes later, I started to become worried about Sierra and Ty. I recruited Sky and we crept over to the portal. Mia was already there.

"Going somewhere, Sparklez?"

"Maybe," I told her, "What were you going to do to me and iEcho back there?"

"I thought I already told you. Herobrine wants you dead, so I'll do the job for him."

Sky glared over at me, "What do you have with Herobrine?"

"He made a deal," Mia begun.

My eyes widened and tried to ignore Sky's stares.

"Herobrine told Jordan that he would release you from the squids if he found the One with the Golden Necklace. This girl was Sierra. I know, you didn't think I would figure it out. I'm smarter than you believe."

"You tricked into thinking you were a girl named Susan. I've known you're more clever than others," I said.

She turned her attention from Sky to me, "But smart enough to make my own deal with him to trick you into believing my fake past? I had to spy on _four different groups_. My real loyalty lied with the squids, of course. Sky's gold… or he calls it budder… is no match for the weaponry of his enemies."

"Your own deal with Herobrine?"

"Of course. How else do you think I got these immense powers. I also forced Cupquake to side with me? She can't resist my power. Her group is fighting with the squids as well."

"Cupquake was innocent! I knew it!" Sky exclaimed.

"Not so fast, Budder King." Mia paused and stared at me, "You're a child of Notch. I designed this whole scheme to get you into my grasp. If Sky or anyone gets in the way… they'll die. And it's all your fault."

"You know what I've learned?" I paced up to Mia and looked directly into her eyes, "It's not my fault. I just have to let fate decipher what the future is going to be like. One moment you have your best friends and the next they disappear. After that you find them three months later and defeat your enemies."

"What did you just say?" Mia seemed confused.

"I've had enough." With my diamond sword in hand, I slit open her throat and watched her fall to the ground. Sky glanced on from afar.

"Uh… I missed something… didn't I?" he questioned.

"Long story. I'll tell you once this whole thing is over."

We dashed to the battlefield. Sky sprinted to Quentin and Ant, while I stayed along the borderline. I noticed Ryan getting attacked from behind so I saved him by killing the squid.

"Thanks," Ryan panted.

"No problem."

**Author's Note: These next few POV's are kind of short, but I wanted to get some information out there. It's also because Chapter 20 is a 10th chapter special. It **_**has**_** to be dramatic.**

Yosh POV

I fought side by side with Snowy. She was running out of arrows so I landed some of mine to her.

"Yosh," she said, "I have to tell you something."

"Maybe it can wait…" I replied, shooting a squid in the eye with my arrow.

"No. It can't."

"Are you hurt? Do you need food? Medicine? What's so important?"

"Yosh, I like you."

"Huh?" Ignoring everything else, I spun and glared at her.

"I didn't know how to say it and I was so worried when you disappeared and Sierra said that I should tell you sooner or later…."

I stopped her, "Sierra knows?"

"Yep."

"What now?"

"Squid!" Snowy shot an arrow into the body of a squid approaching my back. I acknowledged her with a head nod but she smiled instead of usually sarcastically grinning. I smiled back.

iEcho POV

"Echo!"

I noticed Preston running up to meet me. He slashed through two squids before embracing me.

"I thought you were gone. I was so worried," he eyes worriedly looked into mine.

"I'm sorry. I'm okay though. So whatever happened in the past can now be forgotten. We have to worry about these squids. They want me and Jordan."

"Why?"

"I'm a daughter of Notch." He didn't reply. "But never mind that. We have to help Jordan."

"Wait… you're a daughter of Notch?! This is a big deal. Why didn't you tell me sooner?"

"Preston, I was afraid. That if you knew, they would be after you."

"Who?"

"Herobrine."

"What do you mean by that?"

"Herobrine has had a hatred for Notch for ages. He wants his children to destroy me and Jordan and take over the world. They've gotten to seven others."

"I'm so confused."

"Watch out!" I ran behind him and killed a squid. He hurriedly turned around and faced me once again. Mat and Ian raced to us.

"We have a situation," Mat said, a nervous look on his face.

Sierra POV

"Jordan," I tried to cry. Tears streamed down my face. I knew it was over. Ty, Jason, Sly, and I were being held prisoner in the Nether. Herobrine sat on a chair close to us. What he didn't know was that Toby escaped and was sent to get help.

"Mia told me that you were the One with the Golden Necklace," Herobrine smirked. He strut over and pulled the necklace off my neck, "This is Sky's… isn't it."

I dared to look at him and clenched my jaw closed.

"Not saying anything, are you? I'm going to have to take extreme measures."

"Herobrine," Ty begun, "I'll get Beatrice, Ray, and Void… just release the others… for your own son…"

"My son?!" he burst, "You abandoned your family when you figured out that I was up to no good! And then you joined with Notch's ally!"

"I didn't want to end up like Void. She's your personal _slave_!"

Herobrine growled, "Kill them." Furious he paced away from the scene. At least twenty zombie pig men entered the room with budder swords.

"Guys," Ty told us, "I have a plan." He had already untied himself and Jason during his conversation with Herobrine, leaving Jason to untie Sly. I was the only one still in ropes. Determined, Ty leaped up, untied me, and fought off all twenty of the pig men, with Sly and my help. Jason was still in critical condition. We rushed to the portal out of the Nether and ran into Toby. He had the rest of the Audience with him, along with Kitty and Fury.

"We're here to help," Toby announced. Kitty grabbed me, Fury carried Jason, and Toby and the four thousand survivors of the Audience made sure that we easily escaped the other world. As soon as we entered our own world, Toby thanked us for everything and left with the rest of his group.

"Thank you," I mumbled under my breath. Ty led us back to the battlefield.


	22. Chapter 21 - Finale

**The song for this chapter is: Come and Get It by Selena Gomez (the Sam Tsui/Kurt Schneider version works better with the plot).**

I was the one who killed the last squid. Cupquake had arrived and confessed with working with them. She told us that she would surrender and join the Sky Army. Her group had been tricked by Mia into joining her cause. We agreed to this.

After a few minutes of waiting, I finally saw Ty, Sierra, Jason, and Sly approaching the squid-defeated battlefield.

"Sierra!" I ran up and hugged her.

"Jordan! I was in the Nether! Herobrine kidnapped us!"

"Where's the Necklace?" Sky demanded. He stood right behind me.

"With him."

"Dammit!"

I ignored Sky and focused back on Sierra, "Did he hurt you? Are you alright?"

"Yes, yes. I'm okay. Don't worry about that," Sierra told me. She started to look around the battlefield, "Where's iEcho?"

"Sierra!" iEcho yelled and raced to meet us, "Where have you been?"

"Nether…" Sierra panted.

"Herobrine…" iEcho growled.

"I don't think the squids are our biggest problem anymore. Now that Mia is dead… she is not an issue," I finally announced to everyone, "Herobrine is. He wants me and iEcho dead. See, we're…" I glanced over at her. She nodded, despite her nervous facial expressions, "Children of Notch."

"What? How?" Everyone started to panic.

"Jordan! Why didn't you tell us sooner?" Mitch questioned.

"I didn't know!" I jumped in, "I didn't know until about an hour ago!"

"Everyone!" Sky declared, jumping on top of a tree trunk, "_Be damn quiet! For Notch's sake! _I think the best thing to do right now is to help Jordan. He needs all the support he can. You all remember when we joined with his other siblings. Now their brother is one of our own. He can't die…" Sky pouted and slowly sat down on the tree. No one dared to move, "He can't…"

I went up to the tree and placed the palm of my hand on his shoulder, "Sky, I'm not gonna die. You have to believe me on that one."

"I do… Jordan… I really do."

I smiled and helped him up to his feet, "You're the leader of the Sky Army, _Sky_. You gotta take charge now. Everyone's waiting."

"For budder!"

Everyone cheered, not for me, but for the Sky Army.

* * *

You're fighting in the Nether side by side with your best friends, defeating zombie pig men by the thousands. You remember days ago, you were stuck in the exact opposite position. This fight is personal. You need to take revenge on what he did to your one and only lover; the leader of your group; and all your other friends.

You separate from the rest of your group and make your way up Herobrine's tower, a diamond sword in hand. Once you reach the top, he is already waiting for you. Advancing to attack the Nether King, you glimpse at something vaguely familiar. A note. You can barely tell what it read but can make out a few lines: "There is freedom within, there is freedom without. Try to catch the deluge in a paper cup. There's a battle ahead, many battles are lost. But you'll never see the end of the road while you're traveling with me. Hey now, don't dream it's over. Hey now, when the world comes in, they come to build a wall between us. We know that they won't win." This is _your_ note. The note you wrote to your friends. On the first day. The first day that you left the HQ. _And he had it the whole time_. This creates a passion of fury in your bones.

You finally race towards him. He quickly pulls out a fire-flaming obsidian sword and blocks your attack. His blinding pitch-white eyes try to stare into yours but you would never allow him to take over. Sky's budder necklace hangs around his neck. In a single motion, you grab the necklace, pull it from him, and stuff it in your pocket. Furious, he attempts to attack you from the side with his sword but you trick him by running to the other side. You bounce off of the wall and hit him from his back. You remember this maneuver from other events, smiling at the thought. Your happiness is interrupted, however, when he attacks yet again, fiercely swinging at your head.

"Jordan," he says, "Give up. You have no chance against me. I'm too powerful."

"_No freaking way_," you angrily reply. A tight grip on the sword, you slash through Herobrine's neck with a single swipe. He vanishes into thin air. You breathe out and wipe the sweat from your forehead.

* * *

I noticed everything was calm and silent for a few moments. Had I just killed Herobrine? Is it even possible for that to happen? If I did, he wouldn't be very happy. If I didn't, though, I knew he would be after me. But not today. Not today.

Sky and the others had slain all of the surrounding zombie pig men. Since Herobrine could no longer control them, no more spawned. Once meeting back up with the others, I turned to face Sky. I pulled out the necklace and handed it to him. He slipped it on around his neck and created a giant grin on his face.

"We're back in business… for good," he declared.

"For budder!" I started, smiling in Sky's direction.

"For budder!" Everyone else joined in.

The last thing I remember from that day was the shining reflection of the millions of budder swords being held up in the air.

**This concludes it. The last straw.**

**Believe it or not, that was the finale. I hope you liked this story overall. Post a review if you want a sequel. I would be happy as budder to create a second one! I loved making this one and looking at all the positive feedback I've gotten. It's been great!**

**Just let me know if you want to see a sequel and I'll catch you all later.**

**Your fellow Sky Army recruit and friend, **

**Ray**


	23. Sequel!

I don't think many of you know about Back Here in the Wild, the sequel. This update is for those who have no clue what I'm talking about. The sequel is up on fan fiction! It's been up! Cause I know not all of my followers on this story are checking it out! Like it up!


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